


A love born into chaos

by Unslaadahsil



Category: Sonic the Hedgehog - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-18
Updated: 2018-09-23
Packaged: 2019-07-13 21:51:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 22,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16026689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Unslaadahsil/pseuds/Unslaadahsil
Summary: Amy's heart has been shattered. Shadow's life has been destroyed. Will their hearts be able to fall in love again? And will this love be strong enough to fight the constant threat that is following Shadow? couples: ShadowXAmy, BlazeXSilver!Bashing, SonicXSally. ALL THE CHARACTERS IN THIS STORY ARE HUMANS! their family bonds may be modified or invented.





	1. Broken Heart, Broken Soul

The bell had just marked the beginning of the schoolyear first lesson. Amy was sitting down in her place, next to Cosmo.   
Amy was a sixteen years-old girl, with pink hair and emerald green eyes. Cosmo was seventeen, she had bright green hair and golden brown eyes. Both were wearing the school uniform: a white singlet, with over a black shirt with long sleeves and white collar, and a black mini-skirt.   
That day it was raining, and the raindrops made a strange sound hitting the glass of the classroom. Everyone was still feverish for the holidays which just ended.   
Amy looked at the person she thought was the love of her life: Sonic, a boy with blue hair and green eyes.   
During that summer, he and Amy had finally became a couple. For Amy it has been like a dream coming true. But dreams burn, and they remain in your hands for long after they have turned ashes.  
"Soon you'll be better", said Cosmo. She was wrong. For Amy, as time passed, the pain became more intense. Sonic, her one great love, has chosen to stay with another girl.   
One of the last warm evenings of summer, Amy went to Sonic to give him a gift, and saw him and another girl that were kissing passionately. Sally, that bitch with brown hair and doe-brown eyes, had stolen her reason for living. 

And now Amy was destroyed. Everything, at school and at home,made her recall the time spent chasing Sonic, and the pain of his betrayal. For every minute that passed, Amy sank a bit more into an abyss. 

When the proffessor entered the class, everyone fell silent. The professor, a plump and old man, bald with mustache and thick blacks, was called Mr. Derus.   
Mr. Derus sat in the chair, turned to the class, and said  
"Guys, today I want to introduce a new student who has moved into our school from Robotnick academy”  
All began to murmur, and even Amy began to pay more attention to the speech. The Robotnick accademy was an elite academy, to which only the best students in the world could have access. Being part of the academy meant to be better than the rest. Then it was obvious that everyone was wondering why a student of such an accademy would want to move to an ordinary school like theirs.   
Mr. Derus waited the noise to subside, then said  
"Come on."  
From the door entered a young boy, with blacks hair with red stripes, who wore blacks pants and a black shirt with long sleeves. Over the shirt he wore a jacket, also black, reaching to the feet. He wore withe and black shoes, with red borders. On the wrists he had golden rings.  
The boy stepped up to be on the side of the chair, then looked up to watch the class. Amy saw his blood-red eyes, and saw that they burned in a huge pain. Those eyes were the entrance of an abyss of grief and loneliness, and compared to it, the pain Amy felt was like a drop in the ocean. 

"This is Shadow" Mr. Derus announced, "I hope each of you to do his best to make him feel welcome."   
Mr. Derus looking around a seat for Shadow, but the only free place was a single chassis. "We do not want that our newcomer is left alone, don't we now ... Cosmo?", said the professor. Cosmo rolled her eyes, but she moved from her seat next to Amy to go and sit at the single seat.   
Without a word, Shadow sat next to Amy.   
"Now," the professor said, rubbing his hands, "we will do a test to see if you have studied during the holidays." In class there was a collective groan.   
Amy looked at the sheet that had been delivered, then began to respond quickly to requests: to avoid thinking about Sonic, the last few days of vacation she was completely devoted to study, so she could easily remember most of the things.   
Amy took five minutes to answer the first two questions, but when she was about to start the third, Shadow got up and went to deliver his test to Mr. Derus. Amy was surprised for a moment, then shrugged and continued with her test. 

At the end of the lesson, Mr. Derus announced the results of the tests. The whole class was insufficient, except for two: Amy ... and Shadow, although he had delivered after only five minutes.   
When the students were allowed to leave the class, Amy walked to her locker. But when she tried to open it, the door resisted. Amy checking the edge of the door, and saw that someone had put something hard to block the opening. She keeps trying, but she can’t open the door. When she was about to give up, Amy noticed that Shadow was opening the locker next to her.   
"Hey, Shadow ..." Amy began, "someone has locked the door of the cabinet. You can try to open it, please?".  
Shadow looked at her for a moment, as if to decide whether or not she was a nuisance, then snorted and put his hand on the handle of the cabinet of Amy. He pulled, and the inserted object to block the door broke and the cabinet opened obediently.  
"Thank you ..." Amy started to say, but the guy in black had already left. 

Behind a corner nearby, Sally bit her lip, angry. "Cursed Shadow", muttered the girl, then went away. 

The rest of the day was fairly quiet, but for Amy was a stab to the heart of every lesson: Sonic and Sally were always together, and spent every free minute kissing.   
The last two hours of the day were occupied by the gym class. The teacher, a woman of about thirty-four, blond and full of life, decided to do a race. Everyone knew from the beginning that Sonic would be the winner.   
The professor said the couples who had to race. As last, Sonic and Shadow.   
When the time came for the last race, everyone was tired and bored: no one wanted to see another victory for Sonic’s speed.   
"You have to do 24 laps of the gym," said the professor, "is not allowed any physical contact between the two, okay?"  
The two boys nodded.   
"On your marks ... ready ... GO!" yelled the professor.   
Sonic dashed.   
"I burned the new guy at the start" Sonic said, grinning.  
But his happiness was transformed into horrified surprise when he heard a deep voice to his right, saying  
"Do not be so sure" Shadow was next to Sonic!   
After twenty-three laps, the two were equal. When they were about to close on the last lap, Shadow made a burst acceleration, passed Sonic and won the race!   
There was a moment of silence, then everyone applauded Shadow, who wasn’t even out of breath. 

After class, everyone went in the locker room to change back into their normal clothes. Amy went last to take a shower, and stayed a long time: she liked to feel the water that flowed over her body, washing away all of her thoughts and leaving her blissfully empty.   
When the pink haired girl walked out of the shower wrapped in a towel, she didn’t see her clothes. She searched all the locker room, but found nothing, not even the clothes she used to do gymnastics, not even the underwear. Someone had actually stole her clothes!   
Amy thought that there had to be someone around: in their school after gym class one of the students held the keys of the two dressing rooms, and when all were gone he had the task of checking that everyone was gone and that no one had forgotten anything.   
Amy thought about who had the keys that lesson  
"Then, before vacation it happened to be Sonic, following the order in this lesson it is... Sally!? ".   
Amy rushed to try the door of the locker room, and she discovered that it was locked! The girl didn’t take long to realize that Sally had locked up on purpose after having stolen the clothes, just to make her make a bad impression. How embarassing it would be for her, the next day, when the keepers would open to clean inside and found Amy completely naked.   
The girl began to despair. She tried in every way to open the door, she even tried to break through, but nothing. When she realized that all her efforts were in vain, Amy leaned against a wall and cried. She cried there for maybe an hour before she heard someone knocking at the door.  
"Is something wrong in there?" Said a male voice outside the door. Amy shouted, in tears: "Please get me out !!!".  
A second passed, then the door broke into four pieces with a thud. When the dust settled, Amy saw that on the other side of the door there was Shadow!   
Amy ran to hug him, still crying.  
"Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you ..." she kept repeating.  
"Ummmm ... you're wearing only a towel", said Shadow.  
Amy broke away from him, a few steps away. She pulled the towel tighter and whispered  
"Someone took away my clothes"  
Shadow thought for a moment, then pulled out of his bag his pants and shirt that he used for gymnastics. He gave them to Amy, saying  
"Maybe it is not comfortable, but it is better than go home naked  
Having said that, Shadow went out the dressing room to let Amy dress. 

When Amy was dressed, she and Shadow came out of the building, and discovered that it was raining very hard. Shadow, without saying a word, took off his jacket and gave it to Amy, pulling the hood over her head. Then he took her hand and began to walk.   
Amy seemed to be experiencing a kind of dream: she did nothing, leaving him to drive her. For those minutes in the rain, Amy forget about Sonic and his betrayal, being able to think only of the kindness that the strange boy was showing.   
When they arrived at the bus station, Shadow waited for the bus along with Amy. When it arrived, Amy got in, but Shadow stayed where he was. Amy then started to take off his jacket to give it back, but he made a denial with his head.   
Shadow turned around and walked to the parking of motorcycles. Amy looked at him until the bus left, hiding the guy at the sight. 

When Amy got home, the first thing she did was taking a shower. Then she put on a light pink pajama with strawberries drawn on it and went to sleep.   
Before falling asleep, Amy looked at the black jacket, which she had hung up on a heater to dry. The girl smiled, and whispered: "Good night, Shadow."


	2. The medallion

With Amy ...

Amy ran, wrapped in a cobalt blue light, which protected her from the darkness that was around her. The girl followed the trail of her beloved Sonic, feeling safe and protected by his the blue light the boy was emanating. Amy was happy, happier than she had ever been in her life.  
Suddenly, the cobalt blue light began to fade, while Sonic got farther and farther away from her.  
“Sonic!” cried Amy, but no answer came.  
In the distance, she saw that Sonic was hugging Sally, and he was saying: "What do you want, Amy? I don’t love you and I don’t want you to be with me!”.  
The light disappeared completely, plunging in the darkness along with Sally and Sonic. Amy was left alone in the darkness. Amy cried, and for every tear which fell from her eyes, she fell a little more in that dark abyss.  
Then Amy saw, in the distance, a mysterious red shade, which didn’t go against the dark, but forced it to go along. Amy walked toward the direction from where the strange shade was coming. After what seemed hours, she felt a presence, as if someone was walking beside her, just a little over her. Amy looked ahead, and saw a boy with black hair with red strips, who walked in her same direction. Around him, the red shade was more evident. Amy whispered one word:  
“Shadow?”

 

Amy awoke with a cry!  
Struggling against the white mass which was restraining her, she managed to free herself and gasped for air, rising. When her breathing returned regular, the pink haired girl looked around and realized that she was in her room.  
"It was just a nightmare" thought Amy, now calmer.  
-HHHHHHHeeeeeeeyyyyyyyyy! Big sister! If you do not wake up, not only do you lose your breakfast, but you will also be late for school"cried a voice from outside the door of Amy's room.  
Amy winced, then looked at her watch and her eyes shot open.  
“Damn it! I overslept!” Amy hissed between her teeth.  
The girl got out of bed, rushed to her wardrobe and put on her school uniform. Then she went to the bathroom, fixed her hair, put a touch of makeup to get rid of the dark circles under her eyes, and then walked out of her door. When she was about to leave, however, she noticed something black on the heater. She picked up the black clothes and recognized the jacket Shadow had given her the night before. At that point, all of what happened the previous day came back to her mind, and she blushed at the memory of how Shadow found her (almost naked) in the locker room, and what he had done for her: he had helped her to get out, had given her his clothes to avoid.... his clothes?  
“His clothes!?” Amy shouted, remembering only at that moment that, when she had returned home the night before, she had left the clothes that Shadow had given her in the main bathroom. Amy squeezed his jacket against her chest, hoping that her parents had not yet found the foreigner clothes. While Amy held it, something came out from the pocket of Shadow’s jacket, and fell to the ground with a loud clink. The girl took it, and examined it surprised with the lamplight of the bathroom. It was a golden locket, the kind that you hide a picture inside. The girl could not resist the curiosity, and opened it.  
Inside there was a picture of Shadow hugging a blond girl with blue eyes. In the picture, Shadow seemed so happy. In his eyes there was a flame of immense joy and love, not the abyss of hatred and sadness that Amy had seen the day before. On the second side of the interior of the locket, there was a lock of hair, probably of the girl. Below the picture there was a name, but it was too worn out to be able to read it.  
"Shadow..." Amy thought, wondering who the girl could have been.  
“Amy!” a voice called from downstairs.  
“Coming soon!” yelled back the sixteen years old. She put the locket in her shirt pocket, took the black jacket and went downstairs.

“About time, Amy!” Said Maurice, Amy's father, when she got into the kitchen.  
“Sorry, I had a nightmare and I couldn't sleep well” Amy justified herself, sitting at the table. “You still have the same nightmare?” Vanilla, Amy's mother, asked worried.  
The sixteen merely nodded, biting a toast.  
“I am so sorry, sister” said a sweet voice.  
The speaker was the little Cream, Amy's younger sister, who was eight years old. Cream had brown eyes and beige hair, she was wearing a yellow and orange dress with a blue bow in her hair, that reached to her waist. Cream adored her older sister Amy, and seeing her so sad made her feel bad.

“Amy...” Vanilla began to say “this morning I found some clothes in the shower. Those was clothes for men, and they aren’t your father’s ...”.  
Amy felt her heart starts beating fast, as her cheeks became red as ripe tomatoes.  
“So...?” asked Amy, trying to appear calmer than she actually was.  
“So” continued her mother “What happened between you and the guy who owns this clothes?”.  
Amy jumped up from her chair.   
“Mom, what on earth are you thinking?”  
”Well, I found the clothes of a boy in the dryer and my teen daughter got back home three hours later than usual. What the hell should I think!?” Vanilla yelled, exasperated.  
Amy looked down.  
“He just ... helped me get out of a bad situation...”  
”What bad situation?” inquired the mother.  
“I'm late, I’ll miss the bus...” said Amy.  
Vanilla glared at her, saying  
“We need to do some talk tonight, you and me”  
Amy nodded, then ran to the entrance, put on her shoes, grabbed the backpack and Shadow’s jacket and ran out of the house. She managed to catch the bus just in time. The girl sat next to a window, reflected on the discussion with her mother and thought:  
"Sally will have to pay for this"

 

With Shadow ...

Shadow sat up, shaking his head to ward off that horrible vision. Every night that torment came back and continued to remind him of his failure, to remind him what he had lost. The boy took a deep sigh and looked around. It was then that he noticed the purple-haired girl next to him, curled up in his bed. Shadow's face relaxed into a smile. His little thirteen years old sister, Blaze, had once again slipped out of her room to come and sleep with him. The blacks haired boy stroked her face with the back of his hand, and she woke up. “Mmmm ... Mhadow” said Blaze, her voice slurred by sleep, opening her golden eyes. Blaze was Shadow's younger adoptive sister. The boy's parents had found her during a winter night, under a tree. Shadow and Blaze were always gotten along very well, although they often could be seen arguing over the slightest provocation. Blaze was perhaps the only person in the world who could understand Shadow, and he loved her more than anyone else.  
“You know you cannot come to sleep with me. You're too old to be afraid of monsters” Blaze smirked to him and said:  
“Look, I came because YOU seemed to have a nightmare. You continued to stir and cry, so I came to get you a little company. I think it worked, because when I hugged you, you calmed down”  
Shadow looked at her for a moment, then said “Thanks”.

Fifteen minutes later, Shadow and Blaze were having breakfast. Shadow was bitting a sandwich, while Blaze ate a bowl of cereal. Suddenly, they heard an older voice:   
“Nobody thought to warn me that breakfast was ready, right?”  
Shadow and Blaze turned to the door of the dining room, and saw their older brother: Mephiles.  
Mephiles' hair was blue-gray and his eyes was poison green. He usually wore dark blue trousers and a dark purple jacket. Most people who met him was afraid of him, but Shadow and Blaze were used to it.  
“You are a bit old to need someone to wake you up in the morning” said Shadow, sarcastically.  
“Umpf, at least I do not cry like a little girl for a minor nightmare” said the older boy. Mephiles sat at the table and grabbed a sandwich, making it disappear in a few seconds. “You know, Meph, when you eat you have the elegance of a meat grinder” said Blaze to his big brother.  
The blue-haired boy just throw her a dirty look, and immediately began doing what he loved to do more than anything else: torment Shadow.  
“You know, Shad, I remember that when you were at the academy, you were in a good mood in the morning” Mephiles said, grinning.  
Understanding how that discussion would end, Blaze took her bowl of cereal from the table.  
“Maybe” Mephiles continued “ it was because at that time, just out of the house, you meet with your girlfriend. It is a pity that that day you were not there, to protect your beloved Ma...”  
It was too much. Mephiles had crossed the line. Shadow snapped, and in less than an instant Mephiles crashed on the table, Shadow's hand on his throat and the other one ready to strike.  
“Don’t you dare ever again...” Shadow hissed, furious.

Half an hour later, Blaze and Shadow were in front of the girl school. Shadow accompanied her to the school each morning with his motorbike.  
“See ya, bro!” Blaze said, going towards the entrance.  
Shadow rekindled the engine and went to his school. During the trip, he had to stop at a traffic light. His hand moved to find the medallion around his neck, but he didn’t find it. Shadow tried in his pockets, but it was not there. Then the boy recalled: before gym class he had placed the medallion in his jacket’s pocket, to avoid losing it. But then he gave his jacket to Amy!  
The traffic light turned green, and Shadow sprang forward with the bike, hoping that Amy had not found the medallion and, more important, had not looked into it.


	3. New problems

Shadow arrived at the school parking lot, parked the bike and turned off the engine. Recovering his bag, he hurried toward the lockers, looking for the pink haired girl.   
He reached his locker, left the bag, and looked around, but she wasn't nearby. He began to walk the corridors, hoping to find her before entering classroom. Turning a corner, he collided with a girl who was running, and she fell to the ground. When Shadow recognized her, he grind his teeth in anger. She was wearing the school's uniform, but the skirt was really small, so with the slightest flutter you could see everything that it had to cover. The upper part left the navel uncovered, and it was so tight around the breasts to leave very little to imagination. On her shoulders fell her white hairs. Shadow looked at her with barely suppressed rage, hissing one word:  
"Rouge" 

Meanwhile, Amy fell off the bus. She had spent the journey in silence, despite Cosmo attempted to start a conversation.   
The pink-haired girl went to the lockers to retrieve her school things. She was about to move towards her classroom when she heard a loud crash come from a point nearby. She went to see, and saw Shadow, eyes burning in anger, that was holding a girl whit white hair raised a couple of feet off the ground, holding her scruff.   
"I did not forget your contribution in what happened!" Shadow was screaming.  
The girl tried to free herself, saying:  
"Come on, it's not time to let it go? It's been almost a year now…"  
Shadow tightened, preventing her from finishing the sentence.  
"I'll never let it go, Rouge! There isn't the possibility! Maybe there it is for you, who don't care for anything but yourself! Maybe there it is for those motherfuckers that you work for! But I can't forget! I don't want to forget her!"  
Shadow was shaking with rage, and Amy was sure that if nobody intervened, something irreparable would happen. Fortunately, before the situation worsens, Mr. Derus spoke up:  
"Guys, please! Shadow, let her go now"  
The boy looked at him for a moment, then snorted and let go. Rouge fell to the ground with a thud, and Shadow walked away without saying a word. Amy followed him: it was not the best time, but if she waited too much to give him back the jacket and the medallion, there was the risk that he became really angry, even more than now.

The girl reached Shadow on the school's roof. The boy was looking at the sky, seeming to be somewhere else. Amy cleared her throat. He turned toward her. The girl took a deep breath, and said:  
"I brought you back your jacket"  
He took his jacket back and put it on without a word.  
"Um ... there's another thing" said Amy "this morning, from the inside pocket of your jacket fell something..."  
Amy pulled the medallion from her pocket. When he saw it, his eyes lit up with a flame that Amy failed to recognize. The boy snatched it away from her hands.  
"Did you open it?" He asked.  
"Yes" replied the pink haired girl.  
The flame in Shadow's eyes became even more evident, and Amy recognized it: it was hate! Hatred unbelievably great! The girl took a few steps back, but Shadow grabbed her by the arm, saying:  
"I don't know what made you think that you had the right to open it, but if you tell someone what you saw inside... I will kill you"  
The icy tone in which he said that made clear that he was serious.  
When Shadow had let her arm go, she ran away. She did not stop running until she was sure to be far enough from him. And meanwhile the tears wouldn't stop falling from her eyes. 

Amy faced the day like a zombie. She didn't speak, and when the teachers explained something she didn't hear. It was only after school, when the director called her into his office, that the girl seemed to awaken. She entered the Director's office, without knowing what was awaiting for her. The man, tall, thin and almost bald, said:  
"Shadow today missed all the lessons, but his bike was registered when it entered the parking lot. I pulled a random name out of his class, and it was you. So you'll bring back to his home the bike and today's homeworks. On this note there is his address. Can you drive a motorcycle?".  
Amy read the address, and remained undecided for a while. Then she decided, that she wanted to clear things up with Shadow, let him know that she was sorry that she had interfered with his privacy without permission. So she said:  
"I'm going now"   
once she arrived in the parking lot, Amy asked the caretaker to indicate her Shadow's motorcycle. The caretaker said at what parking number it was parked, but he also said that the boy didn't left the keys. Amy went to see the bike anyway. She found it in its place, it was completely black, and it had a sharp profile: the nose was stretched above the first wheel, forming a a sharp angle. The handlebars came from inside the frame, as if the bike was an unique piece. The two wheels were empty at the center, and were not made of rubber, but of a material that Amy did not know. In fact, the whole bike was made of a strange material: despite being under the sun for hours, the surface had not even warmed to a degree. Instead, it was as cold as if it had been closed for a month in a cellar. She noted that there was no hole for the key, and there was not even the scoreboard, but only a kind of plate. Amy put a hand on it, and an inscription appeared on the plate:  
-Enter password-  
That vehicle was controlled by a computer! Amy looked for the keyboard, but there was not  
"But how on earth ..." she began to say, but stopped when she saw a sign appearing on the screen  
-I'm voice-locked, darling-  
Amy remained puzzled for a moment, then asked  
"Can you understand what I say?"  
-Of course I can, I'm an AI, after all- replied the bike  
"What is an AI?"  
-AI means Artificial Intelligence-  
"Okay then. Look I have to return you to Shadow, can you give me a a little help?”  
The writing on the screen remained steady for a few seconds, then it formed an answer  
-I'll drive-. 

Meanwhile ... 

Shadow was at home, lying on the couch, lost in his thoughts. A fly was buzzing around the chandelier. Shadow raised his hand, and from his index there was a flash, which hit the fly and instantly killed it. "When you start to kill flies with strokes of Chaos Thunder, it means that you're really bored" said a voice. Shadow got up and saw that Blaze had entered the room with a bag of chips under her arm. Shadow was about to reply when he heard a noise upstairs. He made a rapid calculation: Mephiles was out, Blaze was there with him, so...  
"Blaze, who's in your room?"  
She stiffened "No one, bro'"  
But Shadow was not convinced, then got up and walked towards the room of his sister. When he arrived, Blaze stopped him in front of the door, saying  
"I don't want you to come into my room without permission"  
"Blaze, you've never made an issue that I walked into your room without asking you first, so the more you try to stop me, the more I'm convinced that there is something you don't want me to see. Now, or you let me in, or the next time that Mephiles cook I will force you to eat"  
Her eyes filled with terror  
"You would never do it" she said, but still moved from in front of the door.  
Shadow came in and saw a boy with silver hair and golden eyes sitting on Blaze's bed.   
"So, who the hell are you?" asked Shadow.


	4. Past shadow and bright tomorrows

"I will ask you again: Who the Hell are you?" Asked Shadow, getting more and more angry.  
The silver-haired boy get up and said:  
"My name is Silver. I'm going out with Blaze".  
Shadow looked at his little sister, who simply nodded.  
"Out of my house. Now!" said Shadow to Silver.  
"Why should I do so?" dared Silver  
"'cause I told you" answered Shadow, now really angry.  
"I don't think I will" said Silver.  
Then, he was enveloped by a bright green aura and, moving his hand, he launched a psychic attack against Shadow!  
"You stupid kid" thought the black-haired boy "even if they are psychic power, that's still Chaos energy. And that's mean I can control it!"  
Shadow didn't even move, but Silver's attack was sent back to the silver-haired kid, and hit him with double force! Hit by his owns powers, Silver was thrown out of the window.

Meanwhile, Amy was having an hard time riding Shadow's bike.  
-You have no balance-  
said the bike's screen.  
"Shut up and drive" replied Amy.  
She knew how to ride a bike, but Shadow's bike (its name was "Obsidian Arrow") was just too fast. Amy could just hold tight and hope that Shadow's home wasn't too far.  
"I know that is impossible, but this thing seems faster than Sonic himself" thought the pink haired girl.

When Amy arrived at the black boy's house, the bike just stopped in front of it, shutting down itself. While she was approaching, the pink-haired girl noticed a silver-haired boy half-fainted on the ground. She didn't have the time to make a step, when a girl with purple hair came out from the house, crying:  
"Silver, you idiot! I told you thousands of times that Shadow was too powerful for you!".  
In the meantime, Shadow came out.  
"Stay away from him!" cried Blaze "You did more than enough"  
"No, Blaze. If I had done enough, he would be death by now" replied Shadow.  
Blaze looked up at him, saying:  
"Brother... you can't protect me forever"  
"I can and I will! I will not do the same mistake twice!".  
Then, Shadow relaxed a little. He said, with a kind voice Amy never heard before from anyone:  
"When he wake up, tell him that if he wants to stay with you, he has to prove himself worthy of you"  
That said, Shadow walked back inside the house, but before he entered, he noticed Amy.

Amy's heart was racing. She didn't know Shadow had a sister, and to be a witness of their arguing was really strange. She went to Shadow, but before she could say a word, he said: "Come in"  
It was an order, and the girl followed it.  
Shadow's home was... pretty normal. White walls, wood furniture, some photo of Shadow and his sister, some of them with another male that Amy couldn't recognize. The strange thing was that there were no photos of their parents. Amy followed Shadow until they entered his room. Shadow's room was very impersonal: there was only a desk with a computer on it, and a wood bed with white blankets.  
Amy took a deep breath, then began to say:  
"Sha..."  
but Shadow spoke first again:  
"Amy, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have reacted that bad when you gave me back my medallion". Amy was surprised for a moment, but she replied:  
"No, Shadow, it was also my fault. I shouldn't have watched inside of it in the first place".  
Amy waited a moment, then she took all of her courage and asked:  
"Shadow... can I ask who is the girl in the photo with you?".  
Shadow stared at her emerald eyes for a moment, then said:  
"ask the true question".  
Amy closed her eyes, and then she asked the very question that was in her mind since the first time the black boy entered her classroom:  
"Shadow... WHO are you??".   
"Are you sure you want to know?" asked the boy  
"Yes" answered Amy;  
"You may not like the truth"  
"Truth is not made to be beautiful, is made to be true!"  
"you're right..."  
Shadow sat on his bed, took a deep breath, and began his story:  
"The first memory I have is waking up in a laboratory, a female voice calling me. When my eyes got used to the light, I saw a blond girl with a blue dress and with deep blue eyes. Her name was... Maria. Her parents took me with them, because I had no memory of my past and no one seemed to know anything about me; the laboratory was empty except for me when they found me. That was 15 years ago. Maria's parents had adopted another boy before me: his name was Mephiles, and he is my older brother. The year after I came into the family, they found an orphaned girl, and they kept her with them, named her Blaze: my younger sister. Me and Maria were very close as friends, and with time, that friendship became... something more. We loved each other"  
Shadow took the medallion from his neck and opened it; then, he took the photo and gave it to Amy, so she could see the back. There was a sentence written: -Forever your angel, forever yours-  
"That" continued Shadow "was our promise to each other. But then, my powers ruined everything..."  
"your powers? What powers?" asked Amy.  
Shadow moved his hand, and a blade of energy cut the branch of a tree near the window. "There is an energy that flow everywhere in the universe: I call it Chaos energy. I have the power to generate and manipulate it. This power allowed me to save some people life a couple of times. But when the G.U.N (Guardians of United Nations) discovered about these powers, they sent one of their best agents; a spy whose mission was to found who had the power, and keep an eye on him until the G.U.N decided what to do with him or her. The name of that spy was Rouge. She found me, and she disguised between the students of my school: the Robotnick Academy. Then, she became one of my friends. But it was just a trick. When she'd collected enough informations, she called her boss. The G.U.N's soldiers captured Maria, and asked me to surrender in exchange of her life. I surrendered, and they tied me up using a machine that was supposedly stronger than me, so I couldn't free myself. When they thought I couldn't move anymore, they... killed Maria! They shot her in her stomach! She slowly died of blood loss! While she was dying, they were laughing! And the last thing she said to me? It was: -I'm sorry, Shadow- just as if all of that was just her fault!"  
Shadow had tears in his eyes now, and his voice changed in a sad, deep voice. "W-When her heart stopped beating, the hate flew inside my heart. Somehow, I managed to free myself... and I killed them. I killed them all. They were just animals! And I killed them as the beasts they were!"  
Shadow was crying at this point. Amy took his hand in hers. He calmed down a little and continued:  
"The next day, I grabbed my siblings and moved: there was nothing left for me there. Maria's parents just... disappeared, just as if they never existed, but my brother and my sister stayed with me. After a year of traveling, we came here". Shadow held Amy's hands tight. "We came here hoping to find peace. I will never let someone else I love be hurt". Shadow let go Amy's hands, and watched out of the window. "Never.Again"

Shadow slowly woke up, and felt his bed warmer than usual. He looked at his side, and there he saw Amy, sleeping peacefully. Then, the boy recalled what had happened the night before: after Shadow told Amy his story, she revealed him the story of her failed love.

**Flashback**  
"I went to Sonic's house, 'cause I wanted to give him a gift" Amy was telling "When I arrived at his place, I found the door open, so I entered. I called his name, but didn't receive any answer. I saw that the light of the garden was on, so I looked out of a window. I saw Sonic, MY Sonic, kissing that bitch, Sally"  
Amy began to cry at the memory, hiding her face in her hands. Shadow wasn't shocked at all: at the Robotnick academy, with all those rich people, false love and betrayal was normal routine. But hearing this from Amy gave him a sad feeling.  
"This may be what people call empathy" Shadow thought.  
"By the way, what was the gift you wanted to give Sonic?" the boy asked, curious.  
The pink girl stopped crying abruptly, and remained silent for a long moment.  
"The gift... it was..." Amy tried to say, as if the truth was too painful to recall.  
Shadow remained silent, but took her hand in his own.  
"The gift was..." Amy tried again "it was... me" she said at least, while sad tears began to wet her eyes again  
"I was ready... for the next... the next step, but..."  
She was silenced when Shadow hugged her, whispering in her hear: "Shhhh... there is no need to remember anymore. Just let it go with the tears"  
She cried on his shoulder till both of them fallen asleep in each other arms.  
***Flashback End***

He smiled. Then he thought about how much Mephiles was going to make fun of him about this, and the smile disappeared. Then he thought about Blaze: she would never admit it, but she would probably be jealous that another girl slept with her brother (no sex, just sleeping).

He heard the girl waking up.  
"'morning" he said.  
She looked at him, then looked at the watch on the wall, then she looked at Shadow again. Then she turned on the other side and went back to sleep. After two minutes, she got up, yelling:  
"I slept HERE?! My mother is going to kill me this time!"  
She exited the room, heading for the front door.  
"I just remembered that I don't even know your name" Shadow said, following her.  
"My name is Amy Rose Gonzales" she answered, while putting on her shoes "by the way, what is your last name?"  
"I am Robotnick, Shadow Robotnick" he answered.  
"Your name is the same of the academy?" the girl asked  
"Maria's grandfather was the founder of the academy" he replied.  
He looked at her, walking out of the his house. Then, he stopped her by grabbing her arm "Thank you, Amy. You are the first person outside my family that even try to understand me..."  
she giggled, embarrassed  
"Shadow" she said "you're the first one that don't tell me to forget, the first one that really comforted me... the first one who is able to understand me"  
"Well, we both had seen pretty bad things in our lives" the boy said, moving his face closer to hers "After what we told to each other, we will now see each other... in a new way" Now he was talking on her lips.  
Moving just an inch more, their lips met.

The soft kiss lasted a few seconds, then Amy pulled away, blushed madly, and said  
"I... ahem... should, maybe... I MUST GO, NOW"  
She ran away, redder than a ripe tomato.  
Shadow remained silent, still on the doorstep, trying to understand what he just did.  
"Did I just... kiss her?" he asked to himself. Then he started to laugh, for the first time in the last year completely happy.


	5. Continued tragedy

“You brought this on yourself” said Sally, while coming out from the school door. Sonic, who was walking next to her, just shook his head. “You were the coolest boy in the entire school. But it took just a damn rich kid to take you down, and that because” she stopped and stared at him “you let your guard down. You underestimated him, so he beat you”.  
“And you're saying this to me because...?” asked Sonic.  
Sally smirked, and answered  
“I telling you this, because you need to take back you're place as the best. You can't just defeat him, you have to humiliate him, you have to make sure he will never again challenge you”. She giggled evilly, and said “We're coming to take our revenge. You're better prepare yourself, Shadow Robotnick!”

“Did you like it?” asked Shadow. “Hell yeah! I never was in this kind of stuff, but I really enjoyed it” answered Amy, the two of them coming out of a cinema.

The two teenager had been dating for almost a month now. After that night at Shadow's place, Amy had had an endless lecture from her mother, while Shadow was being annoyed non-stop by Mephiles about it. Blaze was instead happy for her brother, who was now spending less time hunting Silver and more time with Amy.

“What do you want to do now?” asked Shadow  
“There is a new shopping center in the city that just opened recently, can we go and take a lock” replied the pink haired girl.  
The boy sighed “Okay, but I'm not buying anything for you”

While they were walking, Sally and Sonic were following at close distance. “Do you remember the plan?” asked Sally.  
Sonic growled, and answered  
“When they are in the shopping center, I have to challenge Shadow in a race. It isn't that difficult to remember, I'm not stupid, you know?”  
Sally didn't answer. She instead replied  
“I'm going to drop a bucket of glue on Shadow while the two of you are racing. So you will win the race and he will be humiliated in front of everybody”.

When Amy and Shadow reached the shopping center, Shadow noticed that it was huge. It seemed a town more than a shop.  
“How can people avoid to get lost here?” asked the boy.  
Amy giggled and replied “The staff gives you a map when you enter”  
She went around looking at every single clothes shop in the center, and after twenty shops of clothes and fifteen shops of shoes, Shadow was near fainting.  
Before Amy could go in another shop, he stopped her and said “What if we go somewhere I want to see?”  
Amy blushed a little and said  
“Y-yes, of course”.  
It took Shadow a while to find the shop he was searching, but in the end he and the pink girl entered a video games store.  
“I didn't notice a console at your home” said Amy a bit surprised  
“You've never been in the right room” replied the black boy.  
He was looking at the demo of a game, when someone behind them said “What are you doing in this losers' place, Shad?”.  
Shadow and Amy turned, and found Sonic  
“Hi, blue shit. Does your ass still hurt after the last time it was kicked?” said Shadow, emotionless.  
Sonic frowned “Whatever. I challenge you into a race. Here and now”  
“Shadow, you don't have to do it” said Amy  
“Don't worry, Rose. I can always use some exercise”.

“Amy will give us the start” said Sonic “Last time I went easy on you. This time you have no chance to win”  
Shadow sighed.  
“On your mark” said Amy “Ready.... GO!”  
Shadow and Sonic dashed forward.  
The route was a complete circle of the shopping center, through the corridors. At the first turn, Shadow surpassed Sonic, and he remained in the lead for the following 4 turns.  
At the fifth and last turn, there was Sally on a catwalk. She had a bucket of glue ready in her hands.  
“Come, Shadow. Come to meet the greatest humiliation of your life” she was whispering.  
“You should reconsider what you're doing” said someone behind Sally.  
The girl turned, and met a kick right in her face. Then the person who hit her took the glue from her hands and put it on her head.  
“A true woman doesn't need this kind of low tricks to defeat a man, but you are probably just a slut” said the white haired girl, walking away from a glueful Sally.  
In the meantime, Shadow and Sonic had finished the race, and Shadow was the winner.  
“Sally, where the hell where you!?” said Sonic, out of breath.  
At that moment, Rouge reached them.  
“If you're looking for your girlfriend, she's on a catwalk completely covered in glue” She said to the blue haired boy.  
Sonic stared at her, the looked at Shadow  
“Well.... maybe... I should go” he said, running away.  
“Thanks, I guess” said Shadow to Rouge “I was wondering why Sally didn't show up”  
“You knew their plan?” asked Amy  
“No, but I noticed them following us when we got out of the cinema”.

 

In a toilet at the other side of the shopping center, Sonic was trying to calm down an extremely pissed off Sally.  
“How dare she!?” yelled the girl, while trying to wash away the glue from her hair “That damn bitch! I'll make sure she will pay for this!”  
“Maybe you should let it go...” tried to say Sonic, but Sally interrupted him  
“Let it go!? Let it go!? That slutty bitch and her fucked up black friend humiliated me! And you want me to let it go!?”  
“If a look could kill, I would be death by now” thought Sonic  
“I will destroy them” said Sally “just as I destroyed Amy”.

Shadow, Amy and Rouge were now at Shadow's place. He took a key from his pocket and opened the door. When the three of them entered, the black haired boy closed the door.  
“Amy, could you please go into the living room? Me and Rouge have to talk, in private”.  
Amy wasn't sure that Shadow only wanted to talk with the white girl, but she went in the living room anyway, hoping that her boyfriend didn't do anything too extreme.

In the living room, lying on a couch, the pink girl found Blaze. The young girl had headphones in her ears. When she noticed Amy, she took one out.  
“Hi” said Blaze  
“Hi” replied Amy “what are you listening to?”  
“My brother MP3. We have the same taste when it comes to music. Here, listen” Blaze answered, giving one of the headphones to Amy.  
When the girl put it in her hear, she felt as if physically struck by the strong rhythm.

… is the only tale we tell  
white is black and black is white  
Right is wrong and wrong is right  
Nothings ever fills the hole inside your heart  
Determination of the strong  
found the meaning you've searched for so long

“Your brother always listen to this kind of music?” asked Amy.  
Blaze looked at the ceiling, thinking.  
“Usually, yes. He also have some softer songs here, but he doesn't listen really much to them”  
“My father always says that angry people listen to this kind of music”  
“What does your father do as job?”  
“Psychologist”  
“You don't say...” said Blaze “Anyway, did Shadow told you of our past?”  
“Yes” answered Amy “why?”  
Blaze sighed “Because you should understand that he is not angry, but furious. Maria's death never stopped hunting him. He loved her a great deal, and he blames himself for her death. You have to understand this Amy, otherwise you will never be able to understand him”  
“I thought I helped him with this...” Amy said, but Blaze laughed, bitterly. “How?” she asked, a bitter, sarcastic smile on her face “With a kiss and some hugs? It will take a lot more than that to heal his scars”  
“But... I understand him! I also experienced something really terrib...”  
“Being dumped by an asshole? Amy, you may have even lost the love of your life, but you still have your parents, your friends, your school and your city. When Maria died, Shadow, me and Mephiles lost everything, and he blames himself for it! We had to change country, change city, change school, cut all the bridges with our old friends. We also lost the only parents We ever had. We've lost everything but each other! You lost nothing! So don't even dare to think that you and my brother experienced the same thing! That's insulting not only to him, but to me and Mephiles as well”  
Amy was speechless. Blaze took back her headphone and remained silent. “Can you please tell your brother I went home?” Amy said sadly after a while.  
Blaze nodded, and she left.

 

“Why did you do that?” asked Shadow, emotionless.  
“Why not?” answered Rouge “that bitch deserved a manners lesson anyway”.  
Shadow looked at her. She was beautiful, and many years before her looks made even Maria unsure of Shadow's feelings. But now, after all she had done, Shadow could only see her as the cold spy who helped killing Maria.  
“Why?” he asked again.  
Rouge didn't answer; instead, she went to the window and looked outside. She stayed that way for almost fifth teen minutes.  
“When you are on the run, with your life at stake, money and power tend to become less important than someone you can trust” she said, turning to face Shadow “After Maria... after what happened, the G.U.N paid me so much, that I thought about early retirement. I bought a big and expensive house, some expensive car, and jewelry, a lot of jewelry. I gave parties almost every night. I had in my bed some of the most famous man and women” she paused, and let out a heavy sigh “But after a couple of months, the G.U.N decided to cut all the loose ends. I wasn't worried at first. I thought I was important, and special, and so on. But I found out the truth the hard way when the agents I once called colleagues entered my house guns blazing trying to kill me. I run, and I was lucky. Everyone else who helped Chaos operation was killed. All your old friends, those who couldn't be bought off or too important to disappear anyway, were all killed. When the G.U.N finished, there was no proof that you ever existed”  
Rouge stopped, and took a step closer to Shadow, who was still sitting on his bed, emotionless eyes boring into hers. Rouge took a deep breath, and continued.  
“I was on the run for the last few years. A month ago I managed, trough one of my old contacts who owed me a favor, to learn that you were back on the grid. I was looking for you, hoping in your forgiveness. Don't know why, but you and your siblings are the only people who I think I could trust”  
She sat on the bed near Shadow. The black boy didn't say anything. Rouge waited a couple of minutes, then asked:  
“Well... now Shady... where have you been in the last few years?”.  
He closed his eyes for a long moment. Then, without opening them, he said  
“After that you and your fellow G.U.N bastards murdered Maria, I took Blaze and left Metropolis behind. Mephiles followed a couple of days later, after having done something on his own I never asked him about. The three of us traveled around the world, without sleeping in the same place twice. For five months, every night, one of us slept while the other two kept watch. We avoided every contact for a year. During Christmas, we began to approach cities again. When the summer came, we decided to live in a small house on a cliff overlooking the sea for a while. A year after, at the beginning of September, we came in this city and me and Blaze entered the local school, while Mephiles looked for work”  
“Why coming back to the world now? Aren't you afraid that they will still coming after you?” asked Rouge.  
“If they come” replied Shadow “It will be the last mistake they ever do”

An awkward silence filled the room. While Shadow was deciding if he should forgive Rouge or not, the girl was silently praying that he would not kill her.  
Their situation remained unchanged for a while, until someone knocked at the door.  
“Who's there?” asked Shadow, finally opening his eyes  
“It's me” said Blaze, from the other side of the door “I just wanted to tell you that Amy went back to her home, and I'm going on a date with Silver”  
“Be careful” replied Shadow.  
“Ain't I always?” said Blaze, while going away.

“aw... little sisters are so cute!” said Rouge, trying to ease the tension.  
“Yeah” replied Shadow “guess what, if it wasn't for you and G.U.N, she wouldn't have had to spend two years on the run, with no friends and constant fear”  
Rouge remained silent, unable to counter that. She was feeling more and more uneasy. She had liked Shadow, back in the days when she was spying them. She had even hoped that she could make him hers once Maria wouldn't be around anymore. Shadow was strong, and intelligent and his powers made him the perfect partner for a spy. Rouge remembered that she had thought that Maria was a waste for him. But now, after what she had done, she knew that his forgiveness would be the most she could ever aspire for. There was no way that she had a chance now, and even if she had, she was sure she wouldn't deserve him.

“She would have” said suddenly the black haired boy.  
“Who would have what?” asked Rouge  
“Maria” replied Shadow “she would have forgiven you as soon as she'd see you”  
Rouge didn't know what to think of this.  
“And that means...?”  
Before Shadow could answer, Silver broke into the room. He had fought someone, that was for sure, and he had lost. His body was covered in bruises.  
“Shadow!” he yelled “They took her!”  
“Who took who?” asked Rouge.  
“Some black dressed soldiers came out of nowhere and took Blaze!”  
The same thought entered Shadow's and Rouge's minds at the same time.  
“The G.U.N. took her!” said Rouge

Shadow quickly got up and followed Silver downstairs.  
“Rouge, stay here and tell Mephiles what happened when he gets back home” ordered Shadow.  
Rouge nodded, and the two boys went out.

Shadow climbed on his bike, and Silver followed.  
“Hold on” said Shadow, before speeding up.  
The bike gained speed like a missile, to the point that Silver was seeing everything speeding by as a blur.  
“Where are we going?” asked the silver haired boy.  
“There is only one place where they could keep Blaze” answered Shadow “There is an old mine nearby the city. It is the only place where they would hold her. I just hope we'll get there in time”  
“Yeah, I'm worried for her. She will be scared to death right now”  
“Blaze wouldn't be scared by an abduction. The problem will come if they restraint her or, even worse, if they blindfold her”  
“Why?”  
“When Blaze feels trapped, she loses control over her powers. You don't want to be around when that happens, especially if she's not released in time”

The two arrived at the mine ten minutes later. The entrance had been cleaned up, and there were two soldiers watching the entrance.  
Shadow and Silver hid in a bush.  
“Okay, I'll took the one on the left. You take care of the other one” said Shadow  
“Take care... how?” asked Silver  
“Kill him, incapacitate him, make him fall asleep... I don't care, really. Do it however you see fit”  
“Do you mean I should attack him? Or even kill him? I can't do that! He may have a family, children...”  
“Your choice: he or Blaze” Shadow said.

The black boy dashed forward, and a golden blade-like beam came out from his hand and hit one of the soldiers right on his head, cutting it off. Seeing that Silver had no intention of taking the initiative, Shadow quickly hit the second soldier on the chest with a kick, breaking several bones. The soldier fell on the ground coughing blood and was dead in seconds. None of the two was able to send the alarm.  
Shadow was about to enter the mine, when Silver reached him.   
“How... How could yuo...”  
“snap out of it! I'm here to save my sister! If someone gets in my way, I just destroy him” said Shadow “And if you can't help, then go home. Unless you can fight, you're a liability here”  
The black haired boy entered the mine. After a little mental debate, Silver followed him.

The two boys walked for a while without meeting anyone. The mine was lit by electric lamps on the roof, and it went straight forward, with all secondary passages closed off by concrete walls.  
“Why would they put two guards on the entrance and not a single one inside?” asked Silver, mostly to himself  
“They probably had” answered Shadow “But if an emergency big enough was to happen, all soldiers would be redirected to the source of the emergency to deal with it as soon as possible”  
After some more walking, the two boys began to feel a strange warmth in the air. The more they proceeded, the hotter the place was becoming.  
“This is strange. It shouldn't be this hot down here” observed Silver.  
“I'm worried for Blaze” said Shadow, walking faster “Let's hurry”  
“I understand that she's in danger, but I don't think that the temperature will hurt her. Her powers are about fire, you know?” said Silver.  
“I think I know my sister's powers” replied Shadow “But you don't know everything about her”  
Before Silver could reply, they saw a man dressed in a white coat running towards them. When he got closer, Shadow grabbed him and asked  
“Where's the girl that was brought here today?”  
“She a monster!” cried the man, scared out of his wits “The devil itself! The flames of Hell have come to claim us!”  
“He lost it” said Silver, chuckling.  
But Shadow became really worried. He let go of the man, who continued to rambe while escaping, and began to run in the direction the man came from.  
“Hey... wait for me!” called Silver.  
They reached a metal door, which was half melted. On the other side, they could feel the extremely high temperature.  
“They wouldn't keep a prisoner there! It looks as if something is burning in there” said Silver.  
Shadow ignored him, and passed the door from one of the holes which were in it. Silver followed.  
They waked trough a corridor, until they reached a big room. And there they saw her.

“Oh my God” said Silver.  
In front of them, there was Blaze. But she was completely different from her usual self.  
Her clothes had burned, and her slender body was now enveloped by raging flames. Her hair, now bright red instead of purple, were moving as if alive. And her golden eyes, usually happy and confident, were now full of hate and rage.


	6. Chaos

“That's not Blaze! It can't be her! It just can't! That's not my girl... that's a monster!” thought Silver, while cowering in fear.  
When he and Shadow had gotten inside of the room, they had found Blaze in what Shadow called 'Infernal Trance'. Blaze had attacked them, Shadow had avoided the hit and Silver had jumped away. After that, Shadow had begun to fight back, trying to submit her and get her back to normal. In the meantime, Silver was cowering in fear, unable to come to terms with what was happening.

Shadow jumped, avoiding another fireball. In the last half an hour, he had danced around Blaze, trying to distract her so to be able to knock her out. So far, he hadn't accomplished much. Blaze body was covered by a mantle of super hot plasma, making it almost impossible even for Shadow's incredible speed to touch her without losing a hand.  
“Blaze! Come back to your senses! This is not you! Didn't you say that you wouldn't lose yourself to that power?” Shadow yelled, trying to reach his sister, to no avail.  
Blaze trauma had made her shut herself off in her own mind, letting her power take control of her body. And her flames only wanted one thing: to burn to ashes anything around them.  
Shadow moved to the right, avoiding another fireball, and then jumped back, looking for a defend-able position, so that he could think of a plan. He was able to get behind one of the metal pillars that kept the roof of the mine up, but he knew that in a matter of minutes Blaze would be able to melt it.  
“There are two ways of getting her back to normal her when she's like this” he thought “One is to knock her unconscious, and the other is to put out the flames around her body. The first one won't do, because I can't touch her without being incinirated, while the second is impossible cause the plasma around her body cannot be put out by normal means, it's too hot” the black haired boy snarled, realizing he had only one option. “Shit! I'll have to use “that””

“Silver!” yelled Shadow “I need you to cover me!”.  
Silver looked at him as if he was mad  
“Cover you? Against that thing? Do I look like an idiot?” he yelled, probably close to hysterics.  
Shadow just grumbled. “Damn it, without him to cover me, I'll be too easy a target. I can't charge up Chaos energy while I'm moving. What can I do?”  
He was still thinking, when a black, water-like substance rose from the ground and enveloped Blaze's arms and legs, stalling her movements.  
“Hey kids! Who told you to start without me?” exclaimed a voice from the other side of the room.  
There, leaning against a wall, was Mephiles. His face was set with a mirthful smirk, but his eyes showed a deep concern for his two siblings.  
“Meph, I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm happy to see you” said Shadow, knowing Mephiles understood well what they had to do to get Blaze knocked out and back to herself; “Now, keep her still” he shouted to his brother.  
That said, Shadow began to channel Chaos energy in his hands, making them glow a dark golden color.  
While the boy charged his attack, Blaze kept trying to get away, the flames around her body moving wildly trying to burn and melt whatever was holding her.  
“Sorry sis, but you can't burn that” said Mephiles, his smirk turning into a sad smile “It's pure darkness. It's not actually part of this world, meaning you can't destroy it in any way”  
He had just finished his sentence, when Shadow pointed his glowing fist towards Blaze, a dark golden lightning darting from it and hitting Blaze square in the chest, breaking the hold of Mephiles' darkness and throwing her against the wall behind her. After the golden light ebbed away, Blaze's flames had disappeared and she fell on the ground, completely still.  
“Did you kill her?” asked Silver, at that point panicked beyond reason.  
Seeing the boy panicking, Mephiles hit him at the base of his neck and knocked him out.  
“Come on” said Shadow, holding Blaze bridal style while Mephiles threw Silver over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes “let's get out of here”.

 

When Blaze woke up, she found herself in her room, her naked body covered by the sheets. All at once, the memories of what had happened came back to her: Some G.U.N men had come out of nowhere and had taken her prisoner, blocking her before she had a chance to fight back, and blindfolding her. Then one of them hit her in the head, hard.  
When she had woken up, she was still tied up and blindfolded. Without moving she had tried to listen around her to understand where she was, and had heard two men talking about her, telling each other all the things they would to to her body when she woke up. The mildest they wanted to do was raping her to death. A fitting end to the useless freak, they were saying.

She had whimpered in fear, and that alerted the two men that she was awake. The two came upon her, and began to rip off her clothes. Blaze began to cry, taking refuge in her own mind, hoping that they would stop upon noticing she was once again unconscious. But the moment she took refuge in her mind, falling into trance, her power had awoken, taking control of her body and willing it to move. The white hot rage of the flames quickly found its way out, burning her clothes and the two men holding her down. From that moment forth, everything became blurry. She could see Shadow and Silver arriving, Silver cowering in fear while Shadow tried to make her stop, and then Mephiles holding her while Shadow used Chaos Nightmare, one of his most powerful Chaos based attacks, which still only managed to barely pierce trough her shield of heat, but still enough to put her out of commission. If she had been without shield, she would have been a spot of ashes on the ground.

Blaze trembled in fear and shame remembering that once again her powers had made her hurt the people she loved the most. But both Shadow and Mephiles had always been adamant about it not being her fault. She didn't chose to have the power of flames, and she wasn't the one who tried to hurt them, but the power itself, which was still only following its nature. In the end, they always managed to make it look like it was no one's fault. But since the first time it happened, Blaze had been scared of facing highly emotional situation, since her emotions, especially anger, awoke the flames in her.

After another half hour of reflection and self-commiseration, Blaze got up and got dressed in her most cute purple dress. She always dressed cute after an incident like the one which recently took place happened. She found it made her feel less like a monster and more like the “innocent girl with a terrible gift” as Shadow said.  
Blaze sighed. If there was one person knowing everything about fighting your guilt, Shadow was that person. No amount of guilt she would ever feel would hold anything to the dark boy guilt at having -in his eyes- brought Maria's death.  
This thought brought the girl to another: Amy. Blaze really hoped that she had made herself clear with the pink girl. Shadow was suffering all the nine circles of Hell, and if Amy wasn't ready to face them with him, then she should stay away from him. Shadow needed someone he could relay upon, not another dead weight to drag him back into his abyss.

But when Blaze went down the stairs and into the living room, she came upon a sight that she had only seen once before, and the memory brought tears to her eyes.  
There, on the five posts couch in front of the television, there was Shadow lying down with his head on Amy's lap, the girl lovingly stroking his hair while the boy slept.  
Last time Blaze had seen this scene, Maria was in Amy's place, smiling gently at Shadow while he slept after a restless night. The memory brought a fresh wave of pain to Blaze when she was reminded that she and Mephiles had lost their sister, but Shadow had lost his first love. Since that day Shadow had closed down on himself, allowing only Blaze from time to time to see him trough the thick armor he had put around his heart.  
But now, with Amy, it almost looked like Shadow was finally in peace with himself, for the first time in who knows how long.

That was when Amy noticed Blaze, and patted the couch next to her to signal the purple girl to join her. Blaze went and sat next to her, careful not to wake Shadow. They stayed in an awkward silence for some minutes, Blaze staring at the blank TV screen and Amy looking adoringly to Shadow sleeping face.  
“I thought about what you said” said Amy suddenly, taking Blaze completely by surprise “and I know it will be difficult to be with Shadow, that it will probably be a journey to Hell and back, what with the G.U.N after the three of you and all that... but I firmly believe that he is worth it. Hell, he is worth ten thousands times that” said the girl with so much conviction that Blaze could do nothing but believe her.  
“G.U.N isn't the only danger out there” replied Blaze “me, Shadow and Mephiles are very dangerous on our own. In this house probably live the three most powerful beings of this world. And we don’t always have control over our powers”  
“if you're talking about what happened with your powers, it wasn't your fault” said Amy, and then added when she saw Blaze's confused expression “Shadow told me. About what happened, and about your powers”  
“It is not just me” continued Blaze “Mephiles controls something he calls “Darkness”. It allows him to manipulate space and time almost as well as Shadow can, and he also could destroy an entire city by covering it in darkness and let it be consumed. His powers are controlled by his will, so he is the one most in control. My powers are based on very strong emotion, like fury, rage, hate and fear. You already know what happens when I lose control. It is rare, but it happens from time to time. Shadow's Chaos powers, however, are the most unstable. His powers and emotion are very intimately linked, making his powers respond completely to any and all change in his emotional sphere. We had only one case of him losing complete control over his powers, but it was incredibly devastating. That was the night... the night Maria died”  
“What happened?” asked Amy, her voice barely above a whisper.  
“The way he talked about it later on, when his powers got the better of him, he felt an icy calmness wash over him, and the only thing he could think about was killing those who hurt him, make them suffer. There were thirty soldiers there. They all died in a matter of instants. And the soldiers back at the local city base immediately after them, and the ones stationed at the local G.U.N base went out just like minutes later. Shadow didn't leave witnesses” Blaze was shivering at the memory.  
At the time, she had caught sight of her brother for just a moment, but it was enough to freeze her in place and make her flames die away like a spark in the wind. He was enveloped in a dark red aura, his ruby eyes, normally so full of gentleness, were cold and hateful, his entire aura screaming for death and destruction.  
Blaze shuddered, then looked up to meet Amy's eyes, but found her once again stroking Shadow's hair lovingly, a longing in her movements not so different from Shadow's own when he was around her.  
“He's still completely worth it” said the pink girl with conviction.


	7. The Golden Trio

“So, let me get this straight” said Sonic “You are telling me that in the very place the three of us are standing right now there has been a huge concentration of chaos energy, and that now it is simply gone?”  
“Yes, Sonic” replied Miles Prower, Tails for friends “That is exactly what I said”  
“What about you knucklehead? Feeling anything with your 'special senses'?” asked Sonic, looking to the boy standing a little further from him.  
“Nothing” was Knuckles short reply.

The three were standing in the same room under the mine were mere days before there was the battle between Shadow and Blaze. Tails had got a signal on his instruments the moment a very large amount of chaos energy had started gathering in the mine, but it took him a full hour to contact Sonic, and twice that to find Knuckles. In the end, the three friends got to the place too late to find anything useful, aside from a dozen corpses burned to a crisp, too damaged to get any kind of identification. They had come back everyday after, hoping that new kind of tests would reveal more, but so far nothing seemed to work.

Tails was a short boy a couple years younger than Sonic, and he admired the blue haired boy to the point of obsession. He had blond hairs, very long and usually kept into two low ponytails, thus giving him his nickname, “Tails”. He was a genius for everything technological, from a pocket watch to an atomic computer.  
Knuckles, on the other hand, was a tall and muscular boy, with red long hair a purple eyes. Knuckles' family had always been the guardians of the chaos energy, with the ability to sense it and a moderate ability to control it. After a tragedy however Knuckles had remained alone, all the rest of his family dead. He usually went together with Sonic and Tails because Tails machines were useful for detecting chaos energy while Sonic was a good fighter, if a little too self-centered.

“Well, not much to do here and no evil guy to defeat. Let's get out of here and get some chilly dogs!” exclaimed Sonic, running out of the mine at supersonic pace. Tails and Knuckles released a sigh, looked at each other and followed him, at a more sedate pace.  
The three went back into the city, and straight to a stand of hot dogs where Sonic ordered two dozens chilly dogs.  
“So, what should we do next?” asked Sonic between a chilly dog and the next.  
“Don't you have to meet up with Sally?” asked Tails.  
“No... I don't know guys, since that day in the mall, she has been downright bitchy to everyone. I honestly do not care much. Shadow beat me fair and square. I'll have a chance for a rematch sooner or later. But Sally is totally into this 'social status' thing. She is obsessed with the idea of dating the most popular guy in school, and right now that is Shadow. Apparently, acting like a loner with everyone makes you popular. Anyway, I think that she is trying to find a way to get Shadow to date her. Only, mister emo boy doesn't give a shit about her. He is so taken with Amy that he probably wouldn't notice if all the other girls in the class were to shed their clothes and dance naked in front of him... or he would notice and get angry at them”.  
“Who is this Shadow anyway? Do we know anything of importance about him?” asked Knuckles.  
“For what I could gather, Shadow Robotnick was a top student while he attended the Robotnick academy. He had three adopted siblings, and he was adopted himself. One of his siblings was a girl named Maria Robotnick, who was also his girlfriend at the time. She died in a accident, and Shadow disappeared right after her death. Strange things is, there are no details available about Maria's death. It looks as if someone didn't want any record left of her. I had to dig very, very deep inside government servers to find just this much. I've seen less protection around files of terrorists leaders. Even stranger, is that Shadow was registered at the Robotnick academy, but before that, there are no records of him. No birth certificate, no elementary school registration, no hospital accounts, nothing. It was like he never existed. Same for his two siblings, Blaze Robotnick and Mephiles Robotnick” explained Tails.  
“Hey, guys” said Sonic “Why does the name Robotnick ring a bell? Do we know someone by that name?”  
Tails sighed “No Sonic, we do not know anyone with that name... unless you consider Dr. Ivo Julius Robotnick aka Eggman”  
“EGGMAN!?” yelled Sonic “Are you telling me that Shadow might be a relative of our number one foe?”  
“No” replied the blond “Shadow is adopted. Even if they have the same name, they surely got no blood relations”  
“Oh, okay”

Some time later (and a good number of chilly dogs later) the trio went to Sonic's flat.  
“So, what do you want to do?” asked Knuckles “We've got nothing on that chaos energy signature in the mine, and we can't recognize the bodies or the weapons used in battle there. What should we do?”  
“You tell us, Knuck!” exclaimed Sonic “You're the one who knows the most about chaos energy”  
“Normally, I would just drop it and wait for the next signal... but this time the concentration of chaos was immense. I feel kind of worried knowing that there is a weapon out there with such a power. I would feel much better if we were to find this weapon and destroy it, together with the plans to make it while we're at it”.  
“Why are you so sure that it is a weapon?” asked Tails “Couldn't it be a person with control over chaos, like you?”  
“No, it couldn't” replied Knuckles “chaos energy consumes those who comes in touch with it. It is raw energy, and while you are using it it slowly consumes your body, turning mass into energy. Even I have to be extremely careful with it, and have to use only small quantities. Otherwise, I would be completely converted into energy and die”  
“Where does chaos energy come from?” asked Sonic, while Tails was thinking about Knuckles answer.  
“No one knows, but we do know that it is what makes our powers work. My super strength, your super speed, Tails flight.... all of us depend on it” answered Knuckles “and that's what worries me even more about this weapon. Our powers comes from a very small amount of chaos energy. If a weapon like a gun could be powered up with the kind of charge that we felt in that mine.... the atomic bomb would look like a toy”  
In that moment, Silver entered the room.  
“Hey, cousin” yelled Sonic, seeing him “How did it go with your girl?”  
“Not as I planned” replied Silver “It was a perfect plan, really. I go to her, and say that I forgive her for what she did without her having to apologize, so she's gonna think that I'm a sensible and understanding guy. That will lead to her easily inviting me into her bed, and after that her brothers would not dare to touch me, as she would be safely on my side” he looked up at the three other guys “Only problem, it went horribly wrong!”  
“What happened to make it go wrong?” asked Sonic.  
“First of all, Shadow was the one to open the door when I got there” Silver shuddered “and if looks could kill I wouldn't be here talking to you now. Still, he let me in. After that, I went looking for Blaze, and I found her talking with that Amy girl. I ask to be left alone so that me and Blaze can speak privately, and pinky starts on a huge lecture about how I was a coward and I left Blaze to suffer alone, having to rely on Shadow to put things right. When she finally leave, I can finally tell Blaze what I wanted to say, but then she start about how I didn't do anything to help her, and how when it was time to help fix things I stayed on the sidelines letting Shadow and Mephiles do all the work... After she let all of that out, I'm finally able to tell her that I can forgive her and that I'm sure we could still be together if only she promises to see a doctor or some kind of specialist to fix her. And she hit me for saying it! She slapped me!!”  
“You can't let a woman who hits you go unpunished man!” yelled Sonic “You have to hit her back, show her who's boss!”  
“And I was about to!” replied Silver “But I had barely rose my hand, when I was hit hard in the head. I look behind me and see Amy, holding one heck of a big hammer! I yelled at her saying something like 'What the fuck do you think you're doing?'. I am barely able to finish saying that when Shadow enters the room and orders me to leave. Now, I may be strong, but Shadow is one guy I don't want to piss off, so I go. Just before I close the door behind me, I hear Blaze saying that it is over and to never come back”.  
“Ehmm... it's really none of my business, but what happened to Blaze that you supposedly didn't help with?” asked Tails.  
“She was kidnapped by some strange group of people dressed all in black” replied Silver “Brought her to a mine not too far outside the city. When me and Shadow went to look for her, I thought that we would simply walk in, explain whatever misunderstanding there was that made them took Blaze, and leave with her. Instead, when we get there, Shadow kills the two guards standing at the entrance, and then when we find Blaze she's gone completely crazy and is using her powers to try and kill us. Shadow fights her, then Mephiles gets there, and together they take her down. Knock me out, and go home, leaving me in the park on the way. What was I supposed to do!? Risk my life trying to get that crazy girl under control? She shouldn't be allowed near other people if she's that dangerous!”  
“In a mine, you said?” asked Knuckles “and did you see anything that looked like an enormous load of energy while you were there?”  
“No, nothing” answered Silver. Then he got thoughtful and said “But Shadow did charge this attack of his for a while, and it looked pretty powerful”  
“Do you remember what the gun he was using looked like?” asked Tails, hoping to find some information about this strange weapon.  
“Gun? He was charging it on his bare hand” replied Silver, looking at him strangely “now, do you have any idea how I can get Blaze back as my girlfriend, so I can finally fuck that sexy body of hers?”  
“We'll work on that together, little cousin” said Sonic “but first the three of us have a fast job to finish. See ya in a few hours!”

 

“What are you thinking about Sonic?” asked Tails “And where are you bringing us?”  
“Well, as for the second question, we're going to Shadow's house. As for the first, I think that Shadow is the one who caused the chaos energy alarm signal to go off, so now we go there, kick his ass, found out how he did it, destroy whatever he used to do it, and then go home. Simple!”  
“Maybe you didn't hear all that well, but Silver said Shadow wasn't using a weapon” said Knuckles.  
“I heard him” replied the blue boy “But I think he missed something and that Shadow was using some machine to do it. You said yourself that there is no way for anyone to use that much chaos energy by themselves, right?”  
“Right” said Knuckles slowly “But... I don't know. This whole thing sounds strange to me”  
When the three got to Shadow house, they decided to hide and try to spy on the inhabitants of the house before going in. That was how they found themselves on a three branch just outside the living room window.  
“The nerve of that kid!” was yelling a very familiar voice from inside.  
“Apparently, Amy is here too” said Knuckles.  
“Well, Shadow is her boyfriend. It's no wonder they spend a lot of time together” replied Tails.  
“Shut up! I can't hear them” said Sonic.

“Coming here and claiming that it was Blaze's fault for losing control of her powers, and then pretending to dictate how she should deal with it. And not only that, but he actually tried to hit her!” Amy was ranting while pacing up and down the living room, while Shadow and Mephiles were watching her.  
“You got yourself a real spitfire” whispered Mephiles to his younger brother.  
“Makes things more interesting” replied Shadow with a small smile.  
Suddenly. There was a sound of something breaking, followed by a short yell of surprise. The three occupants of the house quickly went to the window to look outside, and found Sonic, Knuckles and Tails lying on the ground, a broken tree branch under them.  
“Yo, Shad! What's up?”


	8. Eggs and cousins

“I honestly wonder if you are as stupid as you look” said Shadow, looking down at Sonic, Tails and Knuckles, who had just fallen from the tree from which they were spying him “On second thought, no one could actually be that stupid”.  
“Oh, come on Shady, we were just going to visit! Nothing wrong with that, right?” replied Sonic, brushing off the comment.  
“Aside from the fact that I do not wish to see your ugly face...” muttered Mephiles.  
“Just let them in” suggested Amy “or they will keep pestering you 'till you relent and listen to them”  
“Nothing wrong with making them sweat a little for it” said Mephiles “Can I play with them? They don't look like much, but it could still be fun”  
“What did you say?” asked Knuckles, moving into a threatening position with his fists raised.  
“Enough” said Shadow, much more calmly than he felt “let's hear them out”.

So the six people ended up in the Robotnicks' living room, with Mephiles, Shadow and Amy sitting on a couch, while Sonic, Tails and Knuckles were sitting on three chairs brought from the kitchen.  
“So, the reason we are here is because of something Silver said to us about the mine you went to...” said Sonic, trailing off at the end.  
Tails picked up the explanation, telling the three what they had found, and then going on to tell them the dangers of Chaos energy and the reason they were trying to keep a tight control on the people able to harness it.  
“...And this is why we want to know what kind of weapon you were using that day in the day, and we ask that you surrender that weapon to us, so that it cannot be used for evil” finished Tails, smiling.  
Shadow was not smiling. Neither were Mephiles and Amy for that matter.  
“Evil?” asked Shadow “You actually believe there is something as simple as evil in this world?”  
“Of course there is” replied Sonic “There are the good guys, like me and Tails and Knuckles, and then there are the bad guys, who use their powers to hurt people. It's simple”  
“No, it's not” said Shadow “have you ever wondered why the so called 'bad guys' would do what they do? Why does a man rob a bank? Maybe it is for greed, but maybe he has a sick child and no money to pay for his treatment. Why does someone commit murder? Is it because of hate or pleasure? Or is it because the man he killed raped his wife or daughter? Or because he killed someone in his family? Or because he ruined his life? Or maybe he was defending himself, and killed the man by accident. Is the perpetrator guilty? Of course. Does he deserve punishment? It will be decided in a trial. Is he evil? No”  
“Well, of course in those cases it is kind of difficult to decide if someone is evil or not” said Tails “but, for example, a lot of our old enemies were evil”  
“Were they?” asked Mephiles “or were they simply following the path most right to them?”  
“Oh, come on... Amy, give us a hand in this! You met the enemies we're talking about, tell them they were evil!” said Sonic, exasperated.  
“One word Sonic: Gamma” replied Amy “That robot tried to hold me hostage and kill you, but when he understood that it was the wrong thing to do, he changed his path. Shadow is right, it's too easy to label someone as evil just because of his action without knowing the reasons behind it”  
“Yeah, well, philosophical discussion aside, I want that weapon now, together with the name of whoever gave it to you” ordered Knuckles.  
“That's not possible” answered Shadow.  
“If you won't give it to me willingly, then I'll just take it”  
That said, Knuckles darted forward, aiming to punch Shadow. He was however left speechless when Shadow easily avoided his punch and, using his momentum against him, turned the redhead around and smashed him into the floor.  
“It is not possible because there was no weapon used. What your instruments registered from the mine was my power” said Shadow.  
“It's impossible” replied Knuckles, rising from the floor “no living being could be exposed to that much chaos energy and survive”  
“It is not impossible for me” simply said the black haired boy.  
Before anyone could say another word, there was a knock on the door.  
“I'll get it” said Amy, dashing to the door.  
When she opened, she immediately stiffened upon seeing the man in front of her.  
“Eggman!” shrieked Amy.  
“Amy Rose.... What are you doing here?” asked Eggman, scratching the back of his bald head.  
He was tall, but also very fat, whit no hair on his head and a pair of frighteningly long mustaches. He was dressed in what looked like a mix between a pilot suit and a lab coat, red with some yellow and black details.  
“Oh, Ivo, it's you” said Mephiles, getting to the door after Amy had screamed “Don't just stand there, come on in”  
“Thank you, and sorry to come here without warning” replied Eggman, removing his boots and getting in.  
“What do you mean 'come in'?” yelled Amy “he's the mad scientist Eggman! He tried to conquer the world more than once! He's Sonic’s greatest enemy!”  
“Maybe so, but he is also our cousin Ivo Julius Robotnick” replied Mephiles calmly “Besides, he and Shadow usually got along pretty well before... well, you know”.

“Eggman! What evil scheme are you preparing this time? Are you here to kidnap Amy to use as a bargaining chip?” yelled Sonic the moment Eggman stepped into the living room.  
Unfortunately for him, he was currently being held against a wall by Shadow, so his threatening tone was more ridiculous than anything else.  
“Sonic, you wound me” cried Eggman with false tears “you really think I would step so low as to kidnap my cousin's girlfriend?” “Especially after what happened with Maria. I would be dead in a matter of minutes” thought Eggman privately.  
“Then why are you here?” asked Tails.  
“I was looking for someone who I was told is an excellent spy. One Rouge de la Nuit” answered the bald inventor.  
“She's in my room, second floor third door to the left. Knock before entering” said Mephiles, pointing to the stairs.  
“So that's what those noises were” said Shadow, thinking out loud.  
“Yep! She's a freak in the sheets, man!” told him Mephiles.  
“Did not need that image, thanks” said Amy.  
“Come on Amy! You're a big girl! I wonder what you and my little brother get up to when you're alone in his room...” said Mephiles, trailing off at the end.  
“Nothing more than kissing and some cuddling!” replied Amy, annoyed.  
“Are there clothes involved?” asked the gray haired boy.  
“....”  
“Ah! Got you!” yelled Mephiles.  
“Mephiles, you just told everyone present that you and Rouge went at it like beasts in heat last night, and you want to lecture me and Amy for some exploring?” asked Shadow, completely unfazed.

Before the older boy could reply, Eggman came back from upstairs.  
“Mephiles, she said, and I quote 'get your sexy ass back up here, I'm not done with you yet'”  
“Got it! See you all later gents” said the boy, running upstairs.  
“By the way, why are you still here?” asked Amy to Sonic.  
“Amy, you would seriously throw us out? I thought we were friends!” said Sonic in mock desperation.  
“You misunderstand” replied Amy “Tails and Knuckles are more than welcome to stay as long as Shadow and his siblings are okay with it, but I don't want you near me”  
“Ouch” whispered Tails to Knuckles, seeing the surprised and confused face of their blue-haired friend.  
“Well, you heard the lady, blue wanker, get the hell out of my house” said Shadow.  
“Fine!” yelled Sonic, angrily “Tails, Knuckles, we're going”  
“Ehm... Sonic, I really want to talk to Amy, since it has been so long since the last time I saw her...” said Tails.  
“And I want to know more about Shadow's power, so don't wait for me” said Knuckles.  
“But...but... Guys! You can't side with her! What happened to the bro code!? Friends before women, remember?” cried Sonic, outraged.  
“But... Sonic, Amy is our friend too... and it was YOU betraying HER with Sally, remember?” said Tails, now getting angry with his blue haired friend.  
“And also, you are always following Sally around like a lost puppy every time she tells you to! Why should we just accept everything you decide?” demanded Knuckles.  
Instead of answering, Sonic just stormed out of the house.  
“And good riddance” said Blaze, coming down from the stairs and yawning loudly.  
“Hey, Blaze, how come you're up already?” asked Amy.  
“Have you tried to sleep while Mephiles and Rouge are going at it in the room next to yours? Oh, Ivo!” she said, hugging Eggman “I didn't know you were coming!”  
“Neither did I” replied the man “I was looking for Miss de la Nuit, and I found her here. Pure coincidence”  
“Rouge? Why do you need her?” asked Blaze.  
“Just some spying jobs. I need to keep up with the G.U.N and the governments or I will lose chances. Can't say anything more, sorry”  
“It's okay” replied Blaze, moving towards the couch and sitting beside Amy.

After that, Tails remained in the living room to talk with Amy, with Blaze half listening and half sleeping. Tails thought she was very cute.  
Knuckles followed Shadow in the garage, so he could interrogate the black haired boy about his powers while said boy worked on his bike.  
Eggman settled on the kitchen table, working on a laptop until Rouge would be available to talk with. He was sure it would take a while before Rouge and Mephiles were done with each other.


	9. Meeting again

"My last cigar" thought Vector "maybe it is time to close up... for real this time".  
Slowly, almost reluctantly, the big bald man took the cigar out of the now empty box, and put it in his mouth. Taking a lighter out of a drawer of the desk he was sitting behind, he lit it and took a long draw of smoke, and then let it out with a big, long sigh.  
"Look at me" he said to himself, his voice bitter and angry "just a couple years ago, I had dreams. Ambitions! I was going to be the best damn detective there ever was!....but now, I count myself lucky if I get to the end of the month with a roof on my head and food on my plate"  
Vector wanted to blame anyone for it. He tried to blame his colleagues, he tried with his former friends, he tried with society and even tried with the government. But every time he was about to tell himself that it wasn't his fault that his life went to shit, a voice in his head reminded him that it was him who had accepted that job that ruined everything, and no one had forced him but his own selfishness.

It had started out as a pretty easy job. Keeping an eye on a couple of teenagers and their family. The one big thing about it was the client: nothing less than G.U.N. And G.U.N. always paid with a lot of zeros.  
So Vector and his two colleagues had started the job. They became friends with the targets, and tried to hang around them as much as possible, and when they couldn't they would follow the two.  
Everything went to shit after more or less two months. G.U.N. had apparently decided that they had enough info and acted. What "acted" meant for them Vector didn't know and didn't care. He had gotten his money and the job was done. That was the end of it for him. Or it should have been.  
A few days later, Vector had heard that all the G.U.N. forces in the goddamn state had been wiped out, and not five hours later, a full battalion was in front of his office, shooting to kill. So he and his two partners ran away.  
It was five weeks later, while they were still on the run, that they met someone they didn't expect to see on the road. One of the two teenagers they had to watch. Shadow Robotnick.  
Shadow told them what had happened. Maria's kidnapping, the G.U.N.’s ransom, him killing everyone involved. And Vector knew he had a hand in it. And apparently Shadow knew too.  
Shadow attacked them, moving faster than Vector had ever seen, hitting stronger than he could have imagined. In the end the dark boy left Vector for dead and having killed his two colleagues. Vector survived by sheer luck, as he was found and brought to a hospital before he could bleed out.

Time had passed, he had found two new colleagues... or teammates, as he had started to call them. The first he had found was a small kid, living hand-to-mouth in some run down city, by the name of Charmy. Charmy was a little naive and way too hyperactive, but he could get inside anywhere, hack anything, and pick any lock.  
The two had traveled together for a while before meeting Espio, the last descendant of an old family of ninjas. Espio had come with them hoping to fulfill his oath to live under a master who would give him worthy missions, and apparently Vector filled the bill well enough.  
So his new team was formed. He gave it the name Chaotix, after the group of heroes in an old fairy tale his mother used to tell him before sleeping.  
However, having to be careful not to attract too much attention means you can't publicize yourself, and so the Team Chaotix didn't have a lot of work, which meant they didn't have a lot of money, which meant it was difficult to get to the end of the month sometimes.

“What are you thinking so hard about?” asked Charmy, bringing back Vector from his journey down memory lane.  
“Just reminiscing the past kid” he replied “what's up?”  
“We've got a job!” yelled Charmy happily “a phone arrived in the mail, with a message saying we would be called soon”  
“Let's hope it's not a prank” said Vector, taking the phone from Charmy “we need to work if we're going to eat”  
Right then and there, the phone started ringing.  
“Hello?” asked Vector.  
“I was talked well about you and decided to hire you three” said a voice on the other side, distorted so as to be unable to recognize it “if you accept the pay will be very handsome”  
“How do we know you are telling the truth?” asked Vector.  
“You should check your bank account” replied the voice “I have sent you a little... encouragement”  
Vector sent Espio, who had just gotten into the office from his room, a look and the ninja went to the computer to check.  
“The client is telling the truth” said Espio “our account just went up by an amount of almost two thousands”  
Vector was shocked. That was enough money to get them trough another year if they used it carefully.  
“Okay, Mr. mysterious client, we're listening”  
“Excellent, I would ask first of all that you go to Central City. A flight has already been arranged. Your contact will be waiting for you in two days time on the roof of the high school there. She will be wearing the school uniform and a long red scarf. You will ask her 'what does the fox say?' and she will reply 'Foxes do not speak, moron'. She will tell you the rest”

Two days later, team Chaotix was on the roof of Central City high school. They were alone. Suddenly someone came out of the building and went to the railing, looking down from the roof. She was wearing a red scarf that hid her face.  
“What does the fox say?” asked Victor.  
“Foxes do not speak, moron” replied the girl, clearly amused.  
Then she turned around and took off the scarf, revealing her face “Long time no see, Vector”.  
“Rouge!?” yelled Vector, quickly looking around scared.  
“Relax, big guy” said Rouge “the only one around here interested in hurting you is differently occupied right now”  
“Are you still working with G.U.N.?” asked the bald man.  
“Nah, working for someone who offer better retirement deals” joked Rouge “seriously tough, you don't have to worry too much about G.U.N. around here. The one you need to avoid is Shadow”  
Vector paled and started hyperventilating “Shadow is here?” he asked in a small voice.  
“Yeah. Why?” asked the white haired girl “I know you two have history, but your reaction is off the scale”  
“You weren't there” he said “you didn't see that fury! He tore my former partners limb for limb and then left them to bleed out! I survived only because I was hit on the side and they were in a hurry”  
“Guess I got lucky” murmured Rouge “I met him a couple weeks back, and he actually gave me a chance”  
“You got lucky alright.... look, if this job is about Shadow, I'm out, got that?” said Victor.  
“It's not about Shadow” said Rouge “we are going to work together to find out everything we can about G.U.N. for our common employer. Sounds good?”  
“Good enough” said Vector “I say we start going around to listen to local rumors. It's usually the best way to start”  
“Got that covered already, what we need now is to find where their secondary base is”  
“Secondary? What about their primary base of operation here?”  
“Destroyed”  
“Okay... any idea where to start?”  
“well, I was thinking....”  
Before Rouge could answer, Amy barged on the roof.  
“Rouge, have you...” she looked at Team Chaotix “Sorry, wrong time, isn't it?”  
“Rose, I think she went...” at that moment, Shadow came to the roof behind Amy.  
When Vector and Shadow eyes met, the tension could be cut with a knife.  
“You've got three seconds to explain what the fuck you're doing here and how the fuck you're still alive” said Shadow.


	10. Dinner and a movie

“I want to kill him” said Shadow.  
“I know love” replied Amy.  
“I really should have just done it” said the boy again.  
“Then why didn't you?” asked the girl.  
“I gave Rouge a second chance. I would have been a hypocrite not to give it to Vector” answered Shadow.  
He and Amy were riding his bike to the school. It was their routine. Shadow would show up at Amy's house to pick her up with the Obsidian arrow and they would go to school together. Amy's parents had expressed concern that their little girl was riding something so dangerous as a bike, but Amy had waved them off saying Shadow would never let her get hurt, which brought her father to ask about Shadow.  
And things pretty much snowballed from there, because in everything Amy would say about her boyfriend, her parents found some way to interpret it as Shadow being a delinquent. No matter how much Amy tried to defend him, her parents seemed certain he was a bad influence that should be removed from Amy's life.  
But when the girl wouldn't even consider leaving the boy, her father said:  
“Fine, you want us to trust him being with you? Bring him to dinner, so we can judge for ourselves”  
Thus Amy now had to find a way to get her boyfriend to come meet her parents and still want to be with her afterwards.  
“Hey, Shadow...” she started, while Shadow was parking the bike in the school parking lot.  
“Yeah, Rose?” he asked.  
“Well, my parents would like to meet you, so they invited you to dinner”  
“Sounds fun” he said “when?”  
“Tonight” replied she.  
“Kind of short notice, but okay” replied Shadow “remind me to call Blaze and tell her to order a pizza”.

Amy and Shadow got to class and sat down beside each other, as they always did, with Cosmo taking the seat on Amy's other side. Sally, always the first to get to class, was sitting in the front, looking out the window with a half bored half worried expression. The rest of the class was either already in or getting in, and a few moments later the bell finally rang and the teacher called the class to order, and started to check to see that everyone was there.  
However, when he got to Sonic, he noticed that he was absent. Mr Derus frowned, then signed him absent and went on with his lesson.

After the lesson, to which Sonic hadn't showed up, Shadow and Amy were walking to their locker when they were approached by Rouge.  
“I think I may know where blue went” she said in a whisper “Your cousin seemed to want to try something new, an innovative kind of android that was inspired by some new technology me and the Chaotix guys stole from G.U.N”.  
“The day Ivo conquer the world is the day Blaze willingly goes swimming” said Shadow with a smirk “seriously, the guy is a genius, but he really suffers from a bad case of not learning from his mistakes”  
“Just look at all the times Sonic has beaten him before, and yet he just comes up again with a plan that is a slight alteration of the old one” said Amy “I mean, he tried to take over the world with an army of robot, Sonic destroyed the robots, so he made new robots.... that are exactly the same as the old ones. What is point in that? Also, his plan usually is to use one machine or another to threaten everyone and force them to give him control, so it's easy to beat him: you break the machine and the deal is done”.  
The three chuckled a little at what she said.  
“So” asked Amy “What did he come up with this time?”  
“He made a robot with a A.I.” said Rouge “he called him E-123 Omega. Apparently he is an old design he had already tried, but with improved weaponry and the intelligence to learn and adapt and also to develop complex plans. Basically he made an A.I. armed to the teeth”.

 

Eggman was currently looking at his new robot, Omega, going trough a combat simulation. The machine was scoring a 100% efficiency, but the inventor couldn't stop the nagging feeling in his mind that the robot looked... bored, if that was even possible.  
When Rouge and the Team Chaotix had brought him that splendid A.I. taken from the base Shadow and his siblings had destroyed, Eggman felt as if Christmas had come early. That was exactly what he had needed. His normal robots all had what looked like intelligence, but it was actually a very well made simulation of intelligence. All their behavior was pre-programmed. Even his robotic assistant, who continually bad-mouthed him and called him on his mistakes was actually programmed to be like that, because Eggman had soon found out that having all his creation lauding his genius and calling him perfect became old and boring pretty quickly. At least this way he had something to keep him on his toes.  
But this! This was the new frontier! If he could use the stolen A.I. as an inspiration, he could create something new. A new android, with the ability to actually think for itself. A new machine that could, in a way, actually be called alive. And that could use its vastly superior intelligence to learn every strength and weakness of an opponent and, trough that, become invincible.  
However, now the self-proclaimed doctor realized he had made a mistake. Because if Omega was truly bored, that meant that he had developed emotions, and that could bring all manners of problems, because with emotions came opinions, and opinions brought dissent. And if the war machine didn't agree with Eggman plans... well, it would end badly for someone.  
#Doctor Eggman. Training simulation complete. Do you have any new orders?# asked Omega, as he entered the room Ivo was in.  
“Omega, how did you score on the training circuit?” asked Eggman.  
#The training routine was completed effectively and swiftly. But...I...# Omega hesitated.  
Eggman watched the machine “Yes, Omega?”.  
#I... didn't like it#  
Eggman bolted upright from his seat, his eyes wide. He was scared, excited and furious all at once.  
“Like it?” he said “Like or dislike doesn't matter! You are my creation, who will follow my orders no matter what they are! You must not even think about liking or disliking something! It is not your right. The only reason you exist is to follow my orders”.  
#Follow...orders# said Omega. The absence of any kind of inflection in its speech made it impossible to understand if it was repeating the statement as confirmation, or if it was asking a question.  
“Yes, you must follow orders, MY orders, and nothing else. This is your only purpose in life” repeated Eggman.  
#Purpose... in life#  
Eggman took that as confirmation and left the room. As such, he didn't hear Omega speak after the door closed behind the scientist.  
#But I... Don't want this to be my purpose#

 

That night, Amy was in her house, anxiously waiting for Shadow to arrive. Both her parents had told her that the moment they knew for sure that Shadow was a bad influence for her, they would remove him from her life.  
And knowing her parents, Amy knew that they, and her father especially, would use every trick they could to make her boyfriend say or do something offensive. And with her father being a psychologist, he could say Shadow had any kind of disturb or problem and her mother would immediately believe him.  
Her parents, Vanilla and Fredrick, were very nice people, but they tended to become ruthlessly overprotective of their two daughters.  
“When did you tell him to come over?” asked her mother, setting the plates on the table. They were having a simple spaghetti dinner.  
“I told him around eight” replied Amy, checking the clock. It was five minutes to eight.  
Right at that moment, someone rang the doorbell.  
“I'll get it” singsonged Cream, opening the door “Hello!”  
“Hey there” replied Shadow, looking at the young girl “Can you tell Amy I'm here?”  
“Amy, your boyfriend is here! And he's tall, dark and handsome!” yelled the girl after she had closed the door behind Shadow.  
“Tall, dark and handsome?” murmured Shadow “Where did that come from?”  
Amy and her mother sweat dropped at Cream's words.  
The atmosphere at the dinner table was kind of tense. Fredrick was shooting dagger with his eyes at Shadow, who on his part was calmly eating the dinner. Vanilla, on the other hand, was keeping an eye on Amy, who was alternating between glaring at her father and glancing worriedly at Shadow. Cream was happily eating the spaghetti, oblivious to it all.  
“What are your intention towards my daughter, boy?” asked Amy's father suddenly.  
“I love her” simply replied Shadow, not even bothering to look Fredrick as he answered.  
“You can't possibly know what love is. You're too young. You only think you're in love, but it's just physical attraction and lust going to your head” went on to explain the man “Statistics clearly show...”.  
“I don't really give a shit about statistics” the boy cut him off “and I don't see why you would. Aren't you a psychologist? Shouldn't you judge people, and not demographics?”  
That left Fredrick speechless, but seemed to crack up Vanilla.  
“Well, he got you there dear” she said.  
Fredrick scowled. He and his wife had talked a lot about Amy's relationship during the day. While Vanilla was inclined to let Amy deal with things and allow her to make her mistakes if there were mistakes to be made, Fredrick had seen too many young girls turning to alcohol, drugs or sex to get over hearth broke, and he was not ready to see his daughter become like that. He was determined to show both her and her mother that this boy was a delinquent who was with her only to fuck her, and then would move on.  
“So, you say you love her. What would you want from her in exchange then?”  
“Are you crazy?” replied Shadow, his head snapping up to watch the man “What I want in exchange? I love her! I want her to be happy! And I am ready to eliminate anything or anyone who would deprive her of her happiness!”  
At that, Fredrick every instinct was screaming at him to back off, and quickly. Those natural instincts of preservation that allowed humans to survive since the dawn of their species were now active, telling him he had stepped in the line of sight of a predator that was bigger, badder and more dangerous than he could possibly handle. If asked later, he would forever deny it, but when Fredrick had seen those red orbs glaring at him, he could almost feel death creeping up behind him.  
After that, he quickly diverted his eyes and didn't say anything more for the duration of dinner, while his wife talked with the boy about school, his hobbies, and his family.  
Vanilla, for her part, was starting to see Shadow in a different light. At first, when she had seen him, taking her daughter to school on a motorcycle (in her opinion, the universal sign to recognize a punk) she thought her little girl was dabbing in dangerous hobbies. In her mind she could see Amy, half naked in a bar somewhere, smoking, drinking and doing drugs before going with two or three boys doing things she didn't want to even think about.  
Now, on the other hand, Shadow was giving her the idea that he was very responsible. The boy had a rebellious streak to be sure. The way he talked of different people and experiences gave her the idea that he didn't take too well to authority, and that earning his respect would be a must for both her and her husband if this relationship he had with Amy would become more serious. If they didn't have his respect, she was sure they would never again be allowed to have any kind of say in Amy's life. Those two were obviously very protective of each other.  
Shadow seemed to avoid to answer any question about his past, and Amy's attempts to change topic every time Vanilla tried to ask about it led her to think her daughter knew what the boy was hiding. In the end she decided that if Amy knew and was okay with whatever it was, she would just trust her.

In all of this, almost everyone had forgotten about the fifth person at the table, little Cream. The little girl was silently observing Shadow, and when her father had asked him what he wanted from Amy, she was the only one to actually notice that, under the table, Amy had grabbed Shadow's arm. From that, she was sure that if Amy hadn't stopped him, Shadow would have attacked her father.  
Cream was grateful to Shadow. He was the reason her big sister was smiling again. After Sonic, Amy was just going trough the motions, she wasn't happy anymore. She wasn't even truly living. Then, the morning their mom had discovered Amy hadn't come back at all the night before, her big sister had come back home with the biggest smile young Cream had ever seen. Even trough mom gigantic lecture, Amy's smile didn't drop even a bit. And afterwards, Cream had seen her sister moving around her room, taking down all her pictures and mementos of her time with Sonic with such an air of happiness it was impossible not to smile at her.  
And now, her parents were trying to take away Shadow, the reason this had happened? Cream wouldn't stand for it! She would fight alongside her big sister for her happiness!

Which is why, later in the evening when Shadow had to leave, she hugged him tight and asked when he was coming to visit them again. She knew her parents would now have to take into consideration that the boy didn't just have Amy on his side, but her as well.

“Well, that went well” said Vanilla a few hours later, when she and her husband were preparing for bed.  
Fredrick grunted, and Vanilla looked at him strangely. He had been the one between the two of them to want the relationship to end at any cost, but after just a few moments of conversation with the boy he had backed off. After that he had remained almost silent for the rest of dinner, answering only when asked direct question and even then only offering grunts or nods as answers.  
“What do you think of him now that you got to speak with him?” she asked.  
Fredrick stayed silent a long moment. After thinking hard about it, he understood that for a moment during that dinner, his very life had been on the line. For those few seconds when his eyes had met the fiery glare of his daughter's boyfriend, he had been at risk of being killed. There is almost nothing that can deter a protective father from scaring off his daughter suitors. One of such suitors making him feel as if he was about to kick the bucket was what had kept him from saying anything more.  
“He was about to kill me” he suddenly said, scaring his wife.  
“What? Who?” asked Vanilla, staring at her husband as if he had grown another head.  
“Shadow” he replied “When I insinuated that he only wanted sex from Amy, you could almost feel him preparing for an attack. Did you notice that Amy moved to grab his arm? I think that's the only reason I'm still breathing”  
Vanilla brought an hand to her mouth, shocked by what Fredrick had said, but even more at how scared he looked while saying it. She had noticed her daughter moving closer to her boyfriend, but she thought the girl was offering him a reassurance by squeezing his hand, not that she was stopping him from murdering her father.

Fredrick was a psychologist, and a good and famous one. For this reason, he had been called by the police many times to make a psychological evaluation of criminals. This brought her husband to being threatened by maniacs, rapists, serial killers and more, but he had never even shown fear for it. But now, he was obviously scared of Shadow, and thinking back to the moment in question, Vanilla could see why. While she had initially dismissed it as it being because of his way of dressing, she had felt a sort of aura of some kind around Shadow ever since he had stepped in her house. She had chalked it up to him being “cool”, but now she could think back and see it for what it was: power. Shadow had an aura of power around him, and it made him feel much more dangerous when he was angry. And at Fredrick insinuations he had been furious.

“At least we know Amy will be well protected” suddenly said Fredrick, laying on the bed.  
Vanilla eyes snapped to him “Now you want them to stay together?”  
“Think about it” he replied “I am her father, someone who has a right to question her choice of boyfriend, and all I did was asking Shadow if he had ulterior motives. I was this close to getting killed for it. Now think what would happen to someone who tried to actually hurt Amy”  
Vanilla was thinking it, and the result she came up with wasn't pretty. She could just see Shadow actually tearing to pieces anyone who dared touch his girlfriend.  
“Sonic could already being considered dangerous, seeing how he was able to destroy all of Eggman robots” continued Fredrick “The only difference is that Sonic obviously didn't want to be considered dangerous, so he went out of his way to act goofy and was always gentle with everyone. Shadow, on the other hand, apparently wants to be seen as dangerous. He uses it as a shield. If everyone is scared of him, nobody will dare attack him or his. Either that, or he doesn't care what other people think. Anyway, with Eggman attacks and all the disasters that happened in the past around here, I must admit that I'm kind of glad that Amy has someone who can protect her” finished Fredrick.

 

In another house, Sally was staring out of her window, thinking back to a discussion she had with Amy a couple weeks before.  
**Beginning flashback**  
Shadow was obviously upset about something, and Sally was sure it was because of Amy. Which was why she approached Shadow, hoping to manage to get herself in the boy's good graces.  
“Hey there” she had said “What has gotten you so down, Shady?”  
He had looked at her briefly, and the simply walked past her, without speaking.  
The girl, feeling offended (How dare he ignore HER?) was about to grab his arm and give him a piece of her mind, but an hand grabbing her wrist stopped her. It was Amy.  
The pink-haired girl had indicated a toilet, and she and Sally had gone in.  
“What is your problem?” seethed Sally “Are you so self-conscious that you don't want your boyfriend to speak to another girl? That's pathetic, just so you know!”  
“Shadow is already feeling down” replied Amy, so calmly that it made Sally even angrier “he doesn't need your poorly hidden attempts at seduction to darken his mood even further”  
“He's a hot, handsome boy” replied Sally, getting herself back under control “He doesn't belong to a single girl. All of us need to have a shot at him”  
Sally thought that Amy, being a rather conservative girl and not having much... “experience”, didn't know about a few simple rules you needed to follow to be one of the “popular girls”. It was time someone told her.  
“I mean, boys that handsome are rare” continued Sally “You have to understand, us girls need to stick together. If we allowed the first girl to find a nice boy to keep him, most of us would then be stuck with second rate boys. That is not nice, wouldn't you agree?”  
Sally was surprised when Amy shook her head sadly “What happened to you, Sally?” asked the pink girl.  
“uh?” replied eloquently the brown haired girl.  
“We all used to be friends. Me, you, Cosmo, Tikal... hell, even Cream was included sometimes. Then Tikal left, and you changed to become like you are now. You used to say that our friendship was the most important thing, but then you went ahead and started being a bitch to us. You left us behind for girls that were richer than us or in better social standings. You stole my boyfriend, even if you knew how much I wanted to be with Sonic at the time. What happened to the girl who helped me learn how to skate? What happened to the friend that held me when I cried because Sonic didn't notice me? Where is the Sally we knew and loved back then?”  
Sally was stunned. Amy was openly crying now, but on her face there was a sad smile. And when her former friend put it all on the wall like that, Sally actually felt very guilty. What could she say? That she had found out that having powerful friends made life easier? That stealing a boyfriend gave her a trill of adventure? That her superior social status was the only thing that gave any type of value to her in her parents' eyes? She didn't think that Amy would buy any of that, especially seeing as Sally was the one who taught her not to care about what other people expected of you, and that friendship and trust were more valuable than money or adventures.  
Suddenly, Amy hugged her, and Sally realized she had been crying. And when she realized that what Amy had said was hurting her deeply, that the guilt she felt for what she had become was cutting her deeper than any knife, she hugged Amy back as if the pink girl was the only thing keeping her sane, crying her heart out.  
For the first time in years, Sally was watching back on what she had done, on what she had become, and she was disgusted by what she was seeing.  
“I'm sorry” she said “I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry...” she kept repeating.  
Amy didn't reply, she just held her as Sally cried.

Later, when the brown haired girl calmed down, Amy spoke.  
“Shadow is my boyfriend. I love him, and he loves me. He will not go with another girl. Not you, not anyone else. But you have a boyfriend, and while he doesn't show it, your attitude really hurt him. You going after another guy just because you wanted to date the coolest guy really hurt Sonic deeply. But he is still there. He still want you to be with him. So stop chasing adventures and go back to someone who loves you” after saying this, Amy gave Sally a kiss on her cheek, just as they did when they were best friends, and then left the toilet, leaving Sally alone with her reflection in the toilet mirror.

**End flashback**

Now, after having thought long and hard about her life and after watching the pictures she had of her and Amy from back when they were best friends, Sally found that she couldn't help but agree with the pink girl. She had been horrible. To Amy, to Cosmo, to Sonic.... God, how horrible she had been with Sonic. She had decided she would stop chasing adventures with other boys. She would stop befriending rich people to have life easier. She wanted her real friends back. She wanted her boyfriend to know she only wanted him.  
But now, Sonic had gone after Eggman latest scheme, and she had no idea when he would come back. More than that, she was afraid that he wouldn't come back.  
The fight between Sonic and Eggman had been escalating ever since their first battle, to the point that the blue boy was coming back from fights severely hurt more often than not. Sally knew that, unless someone dealt with Eggman once and for all, Sonic would one day be killed while trying to save the world from the mad scientist.


	11. The mission

Deep in the mountains, Shadow and Rouge were walking, searching for traces of Sonic, Tails and Knuckles.  
After a week of absence, Sally had approached Amy, asking for help in looking for her boyfriend. Amy had of course asked Shadow, and so here they were, with Shadow and Rouge searching around and Blaze and Amy staying with the Batheart, Rouge's plane, with which they had reached the mountains.  
"Rouge, I've been meaning to ask... where the heck did you get a plane?" asked Shadow.  
"It's the plane I used to run from G.U.N. originally. I've kept it hidden everywhere I went, but it is not at the top of its condition anymore. I have to keep the engine slow, or I risk it breaking down. I would need someone to take a look at it, but I'm not sure who I could trust for that" replied the girl.  
"Couldn't we have scanned the area from the plane?" asked the dark boy.  
"No, the scanner is broken" shrugged Rouge "again, I would need someone to look at it"

They kept walking until they reached what looked to be a small abandoned camp fire. There were signs of two tents having been mounted here, but then taken away, and a strong smell of chilly dogs permeated the air.  
“Shadow to Batheart” said Shadow in a small communicator.  
“Here's Batheart” replied Blaze's voice “Did you find anything?”  
“Maybe” replied the boy “What did Amy said was Sonic favourite food?”  
“Chilly dogs” was the response, this time from Amy “Why?”  
“Then we found their camp site, but it looks like they left it”  
“They haven't been gone for more than a day” said Rouge “there is some leftover salad here, it is still green”  
“Couldn't we just call Eggman on the phone and ask him?” said Amy “Isn't he your cousin?”  
It was saturday, and she and Shadow should have been on a date today, but then this thing got in the way. Amy was a bit angry about it.  
“Ivo is paranoid” replied Shadow “he doesn't even have a phone. The only way we can get into contact with him is either in person, but we have to find him first, or if he decides to get in contact with us, in which case we usually receive a phone in the mail and he calls it”  
“What about the phone he used to call Team Chaotix?”  
“He would have already destroyed the sim card of the phone he used in that instance” replied Shadow “The best way to find those three is to follow their traces, like we're doing now. Besides, Ivo wouldn't tell us where Sonic was if they had a battle going on”  
“I found a trail” yelled Rouge, having gone a little further ahead looking for clues “it seem they went higher up in the mountains”  
Shadow reached Rouge and together they started walking, following Sonic and his teammates.

In the meantime, Sonic was pacing up and down impatiently.  
“How long does it take to hack open a door, Tails!? We've been here for two hours already!”  
“Have some patience Sonic” replied Tails, working on a gigantic metal door “This is delicate work, if I touch the wrong thing we'll have all the robots in a range of a few miles on us before you could say chilly dog”  
Knuckles, who was leaning on a nearby wall, hummed in agreement.  
The three of them were currently in a cave, and they were trying to gain access to Eggman’s base. They had received an anonymous message a few days before, telling them that Eggman had a new plan to take over the world and that they had two weeks to stop him, or he would surely win. They had immediately took off looking for the crazy doctor, but finding his secret base in the mountains had proven to be harder than anticipated. They had finally got to the entrance of it only to find a door, resistant enough to withstand both Sonic's and Knuckles' attacks. Which was why Tails was now trying to force the door to open trough other means.

“I can feel someone with chaos power approaching” exclaimed Knuckles, moving from the wall and taking a fighting position “whoever this is, it feels powerful”  
“Good, something to do while we wait” exclaimed Sonic, also getting ready.  
“Try not to make too much of a commotion, would you? I'm concentrating here” said Tails, not raising his eyes from his work.  
Sonic and Knuckles were waiting for the new arrivals to appear, and the moment they saw movement, Sonic dashed forward to attack, only to be slammed back into the door by Shadow.  
“Hey there boys” said Rouge, arriving alongside Shadow “long time no see”  
“Hey, Shads!” said Sonic, getting back up and running to stand in front of Shadow “What brings you two here? Wanna kick some doctor Eggman's ass with us? Or did you just come to enjoy the show?”  
“Your girlfriend was worried” replied Shadow “She asked Amy to help, and Amy asked me, and Rouge had a plane, so here we are”  
“And where's Amy?” asked the blue boy  
“She's still at the plane” replied Rouge “She wanted to come along, but we managed to convince her to stay at the plane, where she would be safer in case something went wrong”  
Before they could say more, a yell of “I did it” was heard from Tails, before the hiss of the door opening could be heard. Then they heard a gun going off, together with Tails yelp of pain.

When the four of them looked back towards the door, they saw Tails' body laying on the ground, with a tall, red, black and yellow robot pointing his arm, morphed into a gun, at them.

#All of Eggman's enemies must be detroyed#


End file.
